


time has come today

by teen_dean



Series: time has come today [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Accidental Outing, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon-Typical Violence, Case Fic, Catharsis, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, No one can hate Dean more than Dean, References to Prostitution, Time Travel, Young Dean Winchester, Young Dean hustled but that's not depicted
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-31
Updated: 2021-02-10
Packaged: 2021-03-18 04:41:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 35,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29112468
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/teen_dean/pseuds/teen_dean
Summary: Cas fetches 19yr-old Dean from 1998 to help the team with a griffin hunt in 2020. Dean Winchester, being allergic to self-reflection, doesn't love it. What follows is character-oriented Case Fic with Feelings in an S15 pocket-time.This was intended as a standalone and can absolutely be read as such. The sequel is for people who, like me, got too attached.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Series: time has come today [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2203566
Comments: 208
Kudos: 533





	1. out of time man

Schaffer’s Bar would close down in 2002 after repeated health code violations and an encroaching tax fraud evaluation. Owner Jerry Schaffer would determine that it was better to cut and run, maybe try his luck in Australia or Peru or the Cayman Islands. In 1998, the bar still had a regular crowd of locals who came for the pool tables, the cheap cold beer, and the complementary, if dubiously sanitary, bowls of cheese puffs always left out on the bar top.

Dean didn’t come for the cheese puffs, but he also took free food wherever he could find it. He had a little brother back in a de-enfranchised Motel 6 that was easy walking distance from the bar. Every penny counted, but usually by the time Dean finished his first beer he’d made enough leeway with the locals that he could skirt out of paying for the rest. That was what you called cost-benefit analysis. Yeah, he knew the term. Likely better than anyone else mailing in their latest completed math unit, chipping away at a GED. Hell, probably understood it deeper than white-collar guys in corporate with fancy degrees, who talked and traded with money as a theoretical. Markets and stocks and Dow Jones? All imaginary. Made up number games for people who were always gambling with a buffer, a fallback. What was that compared with going all in, like really all in with everything you got including your dad’s favourite gun, which he really will kill you for if you lose. Going all in even with what you don’t have, all on the chance that your luck is due this round, just so that you can pay the motel fees and maybe get your brother a jug of milk for that off-brand cereal tomorrow morning.

Dean, nineteen now and wiser than ever, didn’t go in for games of luck so much any more. Couldn’t afford to. He had to lean into his knack for showmanship, bluffing, reading people. He picked up pool faster than poker, so pool it was. Schaffer’s wasn’t the kind of place where the bets were high, but nowhere Dean chanced upon ever would be. If he could walk away up ten bucks, twenty bucks—counting in expenses—he’d call it a night well-spent. He’d call forty a windfall, but anything above that amount would cast him too far out of the good graces of the other players. He had to win small to keep the game going.

Cost-benefit analysis.

He was up ten right now. Better than being down money, but he had a couple nights to make up for with the motel and they would come around tomorrow asking. He wanted another round, wanted to double his take, but he’d played all these guys already and they weren’t biting. He leaned on his cue, trying to rustle up another match out of Barry, the one with a look in his eye like he had something to prove, but even Barry looked at the pool table and shook his head. Maybe they’d take Dean on again after the hotshot had a few more to drink, make for even competition against the old fogies. Dean had already played the challenge card, played the cloying card. He couldn’t look desperate, so he resigned himself. A long night of beers, till the guys turned drunk enough and one of them decided he had it in him to win this time. Whatever. It was Rick’s shout, and the pretty waitress brought around her tray with bottles for the table. Dean joined in the chorus of flirtatious howling after her, then laughed and brought the beer to his lips.

Across the floor, his eyes caught on a figure standing in front of the jukebox. He hadn’t seen the guy in here earlier. He hadn’t seen the door open. Dean noticed things like that, having a hunter’s eyes. A survivor’s instinct for casing a room. But he’d missed this guy. Maybe that wasn’t so unlikely. Why should anything stand out about some dark-haired white man in a nondescript trench coat? Except that it wasn’t like what anyone else here wore, with their torn denim and plaid flannel.

He wouldn’t have done anything about it, except that as the record on the jukebox slid into place, the needle came to rest, and Dean knew the pitter-patter beat and that acoustic strum from the first half-second it played. Led Zeppelin’s “Ramble On.” One of his favourite songs.

A man of taste.

Dean looked back at the table, the drunks around him settling into their beers, and it wasn’t worth waiting for them to get it up for another round of pool.

He slid from his stool without a goodbye and crossed to trench-man.

“Zepp fan, huh?” he said. “Me too.”

“That so?” The voice came flat, gruff, but not disinterested. Not when the man’s eyes flashed to Dean’s face and seemed to see right through him. Dean straightened up by instinct. He might be a little taller than this guy, but the man was older, had twenty years on him, likely. It wasn’t the age that gave him authority, but the self-assurance, the unwavering focus.

“Yeah,” said Dean, unused to being on uncertain footing. But he had a mission here. “Hey, you play pool?”

The man’s eyes turned to the pool table over Dean’s shoulder. “Not very well,” he answered.

“Well, you can’t be worse than me,” said Dean with a laugh. He gave a jerk of his chin over his shoulder to the table he’d abandoned. “The guys back there have a bet going that I can’t even win one game. Maybe you and me will be more evenly matched.”

“I’m not here to play pool.”

“Well then what are you here for?” Dean asked. “You don’t look like a cheap beer and cheese puffs kind of guy. No offense.”

The man paused for a beat. “None taken,” he said quite seriously. “Actually, I want to talk to you.”

“Oh,” said Dean. His brain executed a few ineffectual rotations, sorting through possibilities of what that meant. He didn’t have nearly enough information to go off. “What about?”

“Do you want to sit?” The man gestured at a booth.

This could go a lot of ways. Hunter. Monster. Something else. Dean didn’t know which, and he had to stay on guard, but he feigned a careless shrug. Just like with pool, he’d play the hapless idiot until it didn’t work any more.

“Sure. You gonna buy me a beer?”

The man glanced down at the bottle in Dean’s hand, half-full, tipped his head, then sighed and said, “Sure.”

It wasn’t quite on his side, it wasn’t perfectly fluid, but Dean slid into the seat that left him with a better view of the bar’s exits. The man didn’t seem to notice, or say anything about it.

“My name is Castiel,” the man said, and Dean refrained from wrinkling his nose at the weird name. Sure, he knew guys named after beer brands and tractors, men named Bub and Diesel and Nash, but they sounded familiar and natural compared with some fancy, snooty name like Castiel. What the hell kind of name even was that?

“Alright, Cas,” said Dean, right off the bat. “Nice to meet you. Name’s Angus.”

“Angus Young,” said Castiel.

Dean froze. Yes, Angus Young. That was what the fake ID that said he was 21 stated. But Cas shouldn’t know that.

“Angus Young who plays with AC/DC,” explained Cas, as if he were the one who came up with the reference. “I know that’s not your real name. Actually, I’m here because I was looking for you, Dean.”

“Who are you?” asked Dean, tense. “And how do you know who I am?”

“I was told by a… a friend. Of yours. And mine. Where to find you.” Castiel’s eyes were careful, trained on Dean as if prepared that his words might be wrong, might send him running for the door. But Dean wasn’t scared enough to run, which maybe made him an idiot. He didn’t like not knowing what he was up against, when it came down to it. He didn’t know enough, yet.

“Oh yeah? Who’s this friend? What’d he tell you?”

“He’s a hunter.”

“Who?” asked Dean. Sure, that word ‘hunter’ acted like a secret code. It gained a person some measure of credibility. It kept Dean from cutting this guy loose right now. But it wasn’t enough on its own. “If I were to call him up and ask him if he knows you, what exactly would he tell me?”

“It’s not possible to call him up,” said Cas. “But he’d tell you that you can trust me. There’s something I came to ask.”

Dean paused, then sat back against the booth, an ‘Oh’ of understanding passing through his lips. At once he understood this guy’s stilted mannerisms, the awkwardness. This wasn’t the kind of thing he’d likely asked for before, or never easily. Dean should’ve seen it. The trench coat alone said it all. Cas said hunter, but this was never about hunting. It must’ve been Irwin. Irwin who said something about Dean. So he wouldn’t play pool, but this could still end with money in Dean’s pocket.

Not how he planned to make ends meet tonight. But it could be fast and easy in the men’s room at Schaffer’s and it was guaranteed. Money in the bank.

“I see. Say no more.” The sweep of his eyes took in the black blazer underneath the trench coat. “Twenty.”

“What?” That head tilt, those narrowed eyes, as if he just weren’t keeping up.

“Twenty bucks,” Dean repeated. “Look, maybe you heard different from your ‘hunter friend’ but times is hard. In this economy? Twenty.”

“Dean.” The blue eyes looked oddly hard, cold. Dean didn’t want the guy to get mad. He didn’t think twenty was anything to the type of man who ironed his shirts, but only cheapskates came around to places like this, Dean supposed.

“Fine, fifteen, but no lower.” He’d take ten. God, he’d take ten and he wouldn’t have to steal for Sammy. He was over eighteen now and couldn’t risk lock-up.

“I’m not paying you—”

“Then I’m outta here,” said Dean, although it was part of the act too, sliding along the booth. It worked. Castiel was reaching for his coat pocket, his wallet, and he shouldn’t be so obvious, right here in the middle of the bar, but Dean wanted to at least see he was good for the money.

Cas opened his wallet. He took out all the cash that was in there, placing it on the table and shoving it across to Dean. Sure, Dean didn’t have his math credit yet, but he’d been broke enough before that he could tally the bills without even consciously looking at the numbers. Sixty-eight dollars.

Dean stilled, settled back in his seat. He didn’t look at the man across from him, only at the money on the table. “So you’re looking for something a little bit more than a blowjob in the bathroom,” said Dean. “What is it…?” He didn’t finish the sentence. It didn’t matter what the guy wanted. Sixty-eight dollars would solve his problems for a week. He put his hand over the money and slid it forward, folded it and tucked it into his shirt pocket. “Well, where to? We should probably go before it gets late. It’s a school night.” He thought Cas might like that touch.

“You’re not in school, Dean,” said Cas.

Dean shrugged a shoulder, took a pull from his beer. “Not everyone in a bar is twenty-one,” he said.

“You’re nineteen,” said Cas. “Why would you…”

Dean shook his head, shrugged it off. “Caught me,” he said, carelessly. “Thought you might like the wrong side of eighteen. I mean, that coat.”

Cas gave an exasperated sigh, massaging his forehead. “We are going to talk about this later,” he said. “Dean, I’m not here for whatever reason you think I’m here for. I’m here to ask for your help. I’m just… asking you to listen, and keep an open mind.”

Keep an open mind? Dean couldn’t hear in that how it was any different from what he was expecting. If anything, it sounded weirder and more dangerous than anything else yet. He didn’t know what he’d walked into. But he had sixty-eight dollars in his pocket, and that kept him from leaving his seat. Maybe this guy just needed therapy. After all, corner girls likely heard more men bare their souls than wives or shrinks did. This Castiel guy just had something to get off his chest. Probably weird and freaky, yeah, but Dean would still have sixty-eight bucks at the end of it.

“Yeah, I’m listening,” he said.

“I’m from the future,” said Castiel.

“Mmhm,” said Dean, nodding his head and going for ‘understanding in the face of total bullshit.’ “What, like the year 2000?”

“Close,” said Cas. “2020.” Not close, thought Dean, but he rolled with it.

“So we survived Y2K,” he said. “Cool. What’s it like? World peace?”

“Not remotely,” said Cas. “It’s complicated. But in the future, I know you.”

Dean lifted his chin, wondering if there would be a moment he should bow out, and if this should be it. But he could keep up this strange improv skit for now. “Alright,” he said. “Hey, tell me, do I got a flying car? Jetpack?”

“No,” said Cas. “You still drive the Impala.”

“Dad lets me drive the Impala?”

Cas hesitated in a way that looked severely uncomfortable, like there was too much he didn't want to say, and Dean almost bought it for a minute. Almost panicked, except for the fact this whole situation was ridiculous. But wait, how the fuck would Cas know about his dad’s car?

“Cars still don’t fly,” Cas supplied. “If that’s any assurance.”

“You some kind of stalker?” Dean asked. Fair to ask, he thought, with the Impala. With knowing Dean’s exact age. Knowing his Angus Young alias.

“No, I’m....” Cas sighed deeply. “The friend who told me to find you here is you. You in the future said that I would be able to find you in the past and take you to our time to deal with a monster problem. A sort of… specialized monster problem.”

Dean wanted to play cool. He wanted to fire back with a quippy retort. Instead he just shook his head and said, “No, this is way too insane, man.”

“I can show you…” said Cas. He reached into his pocket again. He took out a device that reminded Dean a little of a palm pilot, but without any of the buttons needed to make it work. Cas pressed the side, and the screen lit up in a rich array of colours. “No networks out here, but I have some pictures...” Cas said.

He passed the surprisingly lightweight device to Dean. Dean saw a picture for half a moment, touched the screen wrong, and everything went black again. Cas reached over and easily brought up the picture once more.

That was Cas on the left, just as he looked now, only laughing as he looked across at a man with an identical smile in his eyes. Dean. A few extra lines around his eyes, a different haircut, older muscles. But clearly Dean.

Cas reached over again, swiping a finger carelessly across the screen like it wasn’t fucking Star Trek that he could do this. “That’s Jack, that’s me and Jack, that’s Jack, there’s you again.”

Cowboy hat on, making that stupid fucking face he made in pictures where he was too excited but thought he looked cool. If it were 2020 and Dean knew about Deep Fakes he might have some questions, but in 1998 he didn’t have an easy explanation.

“So I make it past forty,” he said. He couldn’t look away from his own picture, taken twenty-two years from now. It wasn’t vanity, but it was an intensely self-interested curiosity. He was alive with all his limbs intact. He didn’t take that for granted. Some of the hunters who didn’t die on the job retired from field work, not always by choice. Whenever he drove by Macon, Georgia he dropped in on Leigh, a war vet and ex-hunter who’d lost an eye, a leg, and three fingers on separate jobs. An amputation, paralysis, loss of senses, these were all possible hazards of the job. Sanity, too. Hell, Dean thought maybe he’d gone insane right now.

But Future Dean, dorky face and all, he looked happy and whole. Dean wanted to know if it was true. If that picture only captured a rare moment, or if he actually got to have that life. It surprised him to think he made it to forty-one not all that messed up.

He looked up from the phone, found Cas’ intensely blue eyes focused on him. Did the guy always stare with that intensity? Dean felt a pulse of worry, having let his guard down. People here in Schaffer’s, could they see it? This man who looked too hard, this man with a whiff of the future about him, a whiff of something more than what the small world Dean had known till now contained.

“So what’s this problem, and why do you need me? Why can’t he fix it?” He tapped at the photo of Future Dean. The picture unexpectedly zoomed into a close-up of his collar and the corner of his smiling mouth. Dean frowned and pushed the device away, but then shifted in his seat in concern. “Did something happen to him? Me?”

“He’s fine,” said Cas. “You’re fine. Dean’s too old for the job.”

“Come again?”

Cas sighed, evidently searching out the words to give the maximum amount of summary in minimal time. “There’s this Arimaspoi—”

“There’s a what now?”

“The Arimaspoi,” repeated Cas. “Or Arimaspians. They’re a race of one-eyed monsters—”

Dean spit out his beer inelegantly, losing most of it down his chin. He dragged the heel of his hand against his chin, pinched his nose because some of it had gone up wrong and burned, then dragged his thumb against one watery eye. “Okay,” he said. “Okay, you really had me going. Joke’s up. You’re good, though. Kept a straight face, and the trick with the, uh—” He pointed at the device with his picture in it. “Don’t know how you did that part. But I know bullshit.”

“Dean,” said Cas. “This is very serious.”

“Anything to do with the one-eyed monster’s gotta be serious,” said Dean.

“It took a significant amount of energy to get me back here, and I don’t have much time,” said Cas, urgency somehow rising in his voice while remaining gravelly and monotone.

“Your Delorean about to turn into a pumpkin and some white mice?” said Dean.

“Let me finish explaining,” said Cas.

“There ain’t explanations enough as to why you’re wasting my time,” said Dean.

“Stop it,” said Cas. And if Dean thought his expression was intense before, it was nothing to now. The blue eyes lost nothing of their power even as they narrowed in assessment. “Stop being scared.”

Dean wasn’t scared. He could scoff at the very notion. Nothing scared him. He was a hunter, a killer. His dad’s soldier. He faced nightmares every damn day and came out the victor. He was about to protest, but Cas kept going.

“This mission is more than you understand. Even I am more than what you can understand right now.” The demeanor softened. He had Dean’s attention, after that stern outburst. “And we may be requesting too much of you. We discussed it, all of us, and tried to find a way around it, but Dean believed you could handle it. I’m just asking you to listen before you make up your mind.”

Cas’ gaze had dropped while he was speaking, turning heavy-lidded, almost sorrowful. Like he regretted having to be here at all. His little speech raised more questions than answers, but damn if Dean wasn’t hooked.

“Okay,” he said. His future self thought he could handle it when the others didn’t. That made him want to prove himself. (To himself? To Future Dean? Didn’t matter.) He had to prove he could. “So keep on it. With these… one-eyed monsters.”

Cas eyed him warily for a moment, but he evened out his shoulders and continued. “The Arimaspoi we’re looking for has something we need, a special weapon that will help us in another, different fight that you don’t need to worry about right now.”

“Not ominous,” said Dean. “Continue.”

“It’s willing to trade with us, but first we need a griffin egg.”

“A griffin egg,” Dean echoed. “What kind of fantasy mumbo-jumbo is this?”

“You do hunt vampires, Dean,” said Cas. “And ghosts and werewolves. Need I remind you.”

“Okay, I’ll play nice. A griffin egg. Gotta break into the griffin coop?”

“Griffins live in caves,” Cas said patiently. “They’re very solitary.”

“No factory-farmed griffins,” said Dean. “Got it.”

“They’re also very protective of their eggs. They’ll fight to the death to protect them. You won’t sneak an egg past a living griffin.” He said this with that tone of regret again, like he was sentimental about these griffins. Even as he went on to say, “And they’re quite deadly. They have poisonous talons—” Here he made a gesture with his hands, stretching them about ten inches apart, then tipping his head, reassessing, and expanding a little further. “And their beaks are designed for scooping out entrails.”

“Alright,” said Dean. “So… does this griffin have something to do with me?”

“Yes,” said Cas, seemingly relieved Dean had got to the point. “A griffin can only be killed by a first-born, with a specific weapon — which we have, so you don’t need to worry about that part.”

“Future me ain’t a first-born son anymore? That doesn’t scan.”

“It needs to be killed by a first-born before they come of age,” Cas specified.

Dean’s brow furrowed. “You got the wrong year,” he said. “You said it yourself. I’m nineteen.” Old enough to serve in the army. Old enough to vote.

“I’m aware you are a legal adult by contemporary American definitions,” said Castiel. “As a matter of fact, that was a pivotal point in our discussions. But to come of age means different things in different cultures. Sometimes it’s a number on a legal form, sometimes it’s after a religious rite. For some it’s puberty, or loss of virginity—”

Dean laughed again. “You’re _years_ too late for that one.”

It was supposed to come across as a boast. Cas wasn’t supposed to look at him sadly. Like he knew that Dean’s first time he’d been too green.

Maybe he did know. Maybe Future Dean told him that shit. Christ, Dean couldn’t think of why he’d do that, why the hell he’d open that can of worms. Maybe he said it when was drunk. Maybe it was a dare. Maybe they’d been swapping stories and it just came out because maybe Future Dean was honest and balanced and had a real-life friend.

That sounded fake, though.

But still. Scary. Unsettling. He wanted to push past this.

“So, you think nineteen’s the sweet spot?” Dean asked.

Cas tipped his head in answer, a wavering sort of agreement without committing to certainty. “We did our research, and had options between twelve and twenty-one, as far as we can tell in griffin lore. I thought that under eighteen would be unfair to you as a minor—” Dean began to disagree with him, but Cas cut him off. “You, for the record, called me an idiot and threw ‘contemporary American definitions’ back in my face. Which… Perhaps. I know you’ve dealt with terrible monsters at a much younger age, but I don’t want to be the one forcing them on you.”

“What if that’s too late?” Dean asked. “What if eighteen was the magic number?”

“Then at least you’re old enough to factor that into the decision you make for yourself,” said Cas. “We thought the same thing about going past twenty-one. That while every year makes you a greater hunter, we might be off the mark and put you in danger because of it.”

“Okay. So, just curious, why not pop in on me next year?” said Dean. “If you had the option. When I’m twenty and have another year hunting under my belt? I mean, I think I can do it now, but I just wanna know—”

“You break your arm on your twentieth birthday,” Cas said simply.

“Shit,” said Dean.

“You fall on a patch of ice. You’re very drunk. Dean said it stays a little stiff for most of a year, not that it stops you. But he agreed that on account of that you’re in better physical condition at nineteen than twenty. So, I came here.”

“Okay hold up,” said Dean. “Didn’t you just, like, mess up the future? By telling me what’s going to happen? Because now I’m going to make sure I’m in fucking Florida or something for my next birthday, where I won’t slip, and then I won’t have a broken arm, and then you won’t come visit me when I’m nineteen because I won’t tell you about the arm thing, you’ll visit me when I’m twenty. But then... you won’t be here to warn me... about the arm thing—”

“You’re understanding that time travel is complicated,” said Castiel. “Let me uncomplicate it for you. Whether you agree or disagree to come to the future, you won’t be allowed to remember any of this. I don’t like to interfere with memories, but if I don’t correct things and it destabilizes the timeline, others will come and correct it for me with great impunity.”

“I won’t remember… any of this?” He looked at the device on the table between them, blank again now, where his picture had been. He looked at Castiel, with his sharp blue eyes and unflinching attention. He’d opened up a whole world, made everything seem so big, and now Dean knew how small it would be again after. He wouldn’t remember otherwise, but it still felt like a loss.

“You won’t miss it,” said Cas. “It will be harder on Dean, on you in the future, but he knows that already. Or he thinks he does. Now that I’m here, I can’t help thinking…”

“Thinking what?”

“I just wonder if he remembers you as well as he thinks. He won’t forget meeting you. If you come.”

Dean nodded, although he didn’t know why Future Dean should take it hard like Cas said. Would he be disappointed by his past self? Dean looked away from Castiel, idly shoving a rolled shirt sleeve back towards his elbow. He let his hand glance against the front pocket of his shirt, just over his chest. The sixty-eight dollars Cas set on the table to make him stay just about burned his hand.

“I can’t. I’ve gotta look after Sammy. It’s just me and him.”

“Yes, Dean said you’d say that. If you decide to come, you’ll return to this bar, this night, before I walked in here.” Cas paused. “Sam— Sam’s in the future. The weapon we’re looking for, that we’re trading the griffin egg for, we’re doing it to help him.”

“I’m gonna come back, right?” said Dean. “I can’t die in the future, can I?”

“You won’t die,” said Cas. “You have to deliver the killing stroke, but the rest of us will be looking after you. You’ll come back here. Even if we got it wrong and getting the griffin egg doesn’t work.”

“Right. Can’t mess up the timeline,” Dean said. “Don’t want to accidentally kill Future Me.”

“It’s more than that,” said Cas, leaning forward, deadly serious. “Dean, I would never let anything happen to you. Any version of you.”

No one had spoken to him like that before. At once so resolute and searingly earnest, like an impossible promise that could be kept. Even John Winchester wouldn’t say such a thing. His line was self-sufficiency, fostered by a kind of fatalistic paranoia. _You have to learn to protect yourself, Dean._ John would tell him not to expect anyone else to do the job right or to truly have Dean’s back. Outsiders would only have their own best interests at heart. John said not to count on anyone, himself included, because in the end, Dean only had his own wits and skills to survive another day by.

And Castiel said _I would never let anything happen to you._ He said it like he had the power to make it so.

“Alright,” said Dean. “Take me to your future.”

“You can change your mind once you’re there,” said Cas, already reaching forward, two fingers extended towards Dean’s temple. “It’s always up to you. But don’t tell Dean I said that.”

Cas’ fingers made contact with his skin and the bar disappeared.

They’d been sitting in a small booth when Cas touched him, but they landed at an open spot and Dean stumbled back, catching himself on a hand. Cas, meanwhile, fell unsteadily to his knees.

“Cas, are you—” Dean, grown, voice a deep rumble, put his hands to Cas’ shoulder. Helped him to his feet.

“I’m alright,” said Cas, though the tremor in his hand as he, in vain, waved off the assistance belied his response.

“Holy shit.” A different voice, approaching Young Dean, who hadn’t looked away from the face of his older counterpart. The older Dean had only just redirected his attention from Cas to Young Dean. Looked him over with a passively critical glance. Young Dean made a scornful face in return, then turned his head over his shoulder towards the other voice he heard.

It _sounded_ like Sam even more than it looked like him. Somehow, in the intervening years, Sammy skyrocketed in height. And let his hair grow long like a damn hippie. Young Dean’s last memory of Sammy was from after school today. Sam at fifteen, moping because he’d had to say goodbye to Tamara Prescott from their last school in Colorado. Shoving his nose into schoolbooks to take his mind off the girl. Dean teased him about the studious bent, sure, but only as far as it was in his unwritten contract as an older brother. Fact was, when he saw Sam getting serious about grades, he felt sort of proud of him. Sam wanted to go to college and Dean didn’t think it very likely, but Sam ought to have something that made him happy, even if it would never come to pass. John would never let Sam go. But he was good at school, and he liked it, and maybe he could be allowed to hope for things. Just because hope had been trained out of Dean early didn’t mean Sam had to be like that.

God, it was something else seeing Sam _here_. Grown-up. _Okay_. Not broken, not dead. “Sammy, you kidding me? That you?” Young Dean opened his arms for a hug like it had been a million years (it sort of had and hadn’t been), and Sam responded on instinct. A brief embrace, then Young Dean had his hand on Sam’s arm. “Look at you. Turned out alright.”

“Yeah. Dean.” Sam looked over at his actually-older older brother, then back at Young Dean. “Yeah. Alright. This is weird.”

“Some kind of Freaky Friday,” said Dean, voice flat, tense. “But we’re the same freaking person.”

Young Dean looked back at Dean, surveying him again. Still standing close to Cas, like he didn’t quite trust the thing Cas brought back. Young Dean looked around himself, taking in the rest of the room. “Speaking of freaky,” he said. “What’s this place? They don’t have windows in the future?”

“It’s the bunker,” said Sam. “We live here. It’s a long story. How much did you tell him, Cas?”

“Very little,” said Cas, still looking wan and unsteady. He nobly attempted to keep his shit together, though, which Young Dean could respect. “I told him what we’re after and why we need his help, but everything between _then_ ,” he gestured at Young Dean, “and _now_ I thought might take more time than I had.”

“We can fill him in on what he needs to know,” said Dean. “As much as he needs to know it.”

“He’ll forget it all later,” Cas reminded them. He looked paler every moment, barely holding it together, but still able to provide his precise brand of dry commentary. “But there’s also a lot that will shake up his world.”

“What will shake up my world?” said Young Dean.

“For starters,” said Cas, “you should’ve asked how I even time-travelled you from 1998 to today.” One shaking hand reached for stabilization, and Dean was still there beside him, giving his arm in support, expression at once attentive and troubled. “I’m an angel of the Lord. We’ll meet, ten years from where you are, in Hell.” Cas swooned, and it was instant the way Dean caught him, careful and efficient the way he manoeuvred his slumped form to a chair.

“That’s an angel?” said Young Dean.

“Cas is a bit… fallen,” said Sam. “But he’s an angel, yeah.”

“Angels are real,” said Young Dean. “And they aren’t like monsters? I mean, we don’t kill them?”

“We do if they’re dicks,” said Dean, looking over his shoulder. He locked eyes with his younger self, didn’t like it, and looked back to Castiel. Under his breath he said, “This was a bad idea, Cas.”

“Dean, you eaten?” said Sam.

“I’m not hungry,” said Dean, still studying Cas’ bowed head, colourless face.

“I meant Young Dean,” said Sam.

“Hell, I could eat,” said Young Dean. “What d’you got in this joint?”

“I’m sure Dean wouldn’t begrudge you some of his leftover Chinese—”

“Hey,” said Dean. “I’m _saving_ that.”

“Save it much longer and it will turn into a science project,” said Sam. “C’mon, Dean. I mean. Proto-Dean. Fuck, what should I call you?”

“I mean,” said Young Dean. “I’m just Dean. Still Dean.”

“He’s Teen-Dean,” said Dean furiously, standing up. “ _I’m_ Dean. He’s Teen-Dean.”

“Why do you get to be Dean?” asked Young Dean.

“This is my timeline. I’m present-day Dean. This is my reality, and you’re the visitor. So that settles it. I’m Dean, he’s Teen-Dean.”

“I hate it already,” said Sam. “This is going to be a long few days. Well, Teen-Dean? Should we grab some grub?”

“If _Dean_ gives his say-so,” said Young Dean

“Fuck off,” said Dean. “Whatever. Eat the Chinese food. Just get out of my hair.”

“I gotta say, I’m glad I still have hair,” said Young Dean.

Dean scowled.

Cas was out of it, but his lashes fluttered, eyes following Young Dean as he trailed after Sam into the kitchen. “You should go talk with him,” said Cas. “Explain things.”

“He can wait a minute,” said Dean. “You’re looking a little out of it.”

“I’m fine,” Cas said. Still pale, drooping, unfocused.

“Bullshit,” said Dean.

“I _will_ be fine. He likely wants to talk to you,” said Cas.

“Actually, I don’t think he does,” said Dean. Maybe he was projecting. Something about this Other Dean, this younger version of himself, put him off. Young Dean and Sammy could connect, they seemed to like each other, to find their dynamic almost at once. Young Dean was somehow still the proud older brother, even if Sammy had almost twenty years on him. “I should know. If I was me, I wouldn’t actually want to know anything about my future.”

“You are you.” Cas didn’t bother hiding his annoyance. It permeated his voice. “I suppose it makes sense that you’re at odds. No one hates you more than you do, Dean.”

“Whoa, what the hell?” said Dean.

“I wasn’t supposed to say that out loud,” said Castiel. “Although it’s true.”

“You could warn a guy before you come at him like that,” said Dean. He wanted to be angry, but Cas looked too close to passing out for Dean to rustle up anything beyond mild chagrin.

“He was curious about you,” said Cas. “About his future. But cautious. He doesn’t want to know too much. Even though I told him he won’t remember this time.”

“Humans aren’t actually supposed to know our futures,” said Dean. “We don’t want to know what’s really ahead. We just think we do.”

“That’s a very astute observation,” said Cas.

“I guess I feel for him.”

“You should. He’s you. He’s… Dean, he’s so young. Are you sure about this?”

“I said I could handle it,” said Dean. “I dealt with more than my share of shit by that age.”

“You don’t look at him and think…”

“Think what?”

“I want to spare him the suffering.” Cas’ eyes turned up towards Dean, plaintive and sincere. “I’d try to spare you from suffering, too. If I thought it would get me anywhere.”

Dean’s mouth twitched in a serious frown. He clapped a hand briefly against Cas’ shoulder. “You know better than that,” he said.

“Mm.” Cas gave a resigned nod.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> » Cas' powers are whatever the hell I need them for in the story as a tribute to _Supernatural_  
>  » if you need to know when this takes place narratively, let's say it's some pocket-world time in Season 15, because if this fic proves anything it's that time is fake and linearity is for squares  
> » am I full of regret for creating a story with two Deans interacting because it's hell to write "said Dean to Dean" over and over? yeah I am! but you're reading it, so you get to join me in this misery  
> » story title reference: "Time Has Come Today" by The Chambers Brothers  
> » ch. 1 title reference: "Out of Time Man" by Mano Negra


	2. hold your head up high

“So I need the special sword to kill the griffin?”

“No,” said Dean. “You’re going after the egg so we can _get_ the special sword. The machete will do for killing the griffin because it’s gonna be a gift.”

“According to the lore,” said Sam, “it’s the characteristics of the hunter that matter most, not the type of weapon. But it does seem like the weapon has to be bestowed in some way—”

“So Sam will gift you my machete,” said Dean. “It’s your strongest suit.”

“We worried it won’t work if Dean gifts it to you, since, well, he’s you,” said Sam.

“But you’re sure about the firstborn thing,” said Young Dean. A doubtful expression wrinkled up his forehead.

“Firstborn son or daughter. Both come up in the stories.”

“But you’re not sure about the age cut-off?”

“The references are vague,” Sam admitted. He splayed a hand absently against one of the many open books on the table between the four of them. “It seems like most of the successful hunters were teenagers, wherever an age is given. But we don’t actually know if it’s a hard number…”

“Or if it’s a rite of passage,” Cas took over. “Quite a few of the stories end in marriages, or becoming head of the household in some way, taking up their parents’ mantle.”

“Dean’s not married,” Young Dean pointed out.

Dean shot him an annoyed look. He knew himself, and he knew there was an implicit criticism in the comment. “Yeah, I’m aware.”

“But for me,” said Young Dean, “dad’s still around. He’s dead here. Isn’t he?” He spoke with flat tones. His green-eyed gaze wandered between their faces, searching out any attempt at dissembling.

Sam’s morose face gave away the answer before he even nodded. “Yeah. He is.”

“It wasn’t hard to guess,” said Young Dean, slicing through the tension between them all. A little too practical, a little too cut-and-dry in his tone, but Dean understood that, too. Self-protection via self-deception. Works like a charm. “He’s not here giving the orders. And I can’t picture him being on board with… all this.” He raised a finger in an impassive gesture at the bunker.

“What d’you mean by that?” Dean asked, still surly.

“A home base, all protected, all these fancy books and macguffins around you, then whatever shit that comes up with.” He gestured at Sam’s laptop. “What happened to really _working_ a job, boots on the ground, being _out there_ when the bad shit happens?”

“Our problems got a lot bigger,” Dean said. “You don’t even know. We don’t just deal with some lousy vamp nests and a budding rugaru. We’ve stopped the apocalypse half a dozen times.”

Young Dean tipped his head, doubtful and curious. Cas’ voice cut across any further commentary: “That’s not relevant to our current mission. We were discussing the point of coming of age.”

“I don’t wanna know, for the record,” said Young Dean. “How he dies, or when. If he did it. If he found old Yellow Eyes. I gotta believe we’ll pick up that trail tomorrow, for my own sanity, you understand?”

Instead of reiterating that Young Dean wouldn’t remember what he learned, Cas said, “Understood.”

“So unmarried, dad’s alive, and I’m still a teenager, those are in our pros column. What’s in the ‘Actually This Might Not Work’ side?” asked Young Dean.

“You are an adult in the eyes of the prevailing law of the country,” said Castiel.

“You probably _feel_ like an adult in your own head, too,” said Sam. “For what that’s worth.”

“An adult who can’t buy himself a fucking drink,” said Young Dean. “Not with my own ID, anyway. What’s up with that, right?”

“Right,” said Sam. “There are a lot of things that have arbitrary cut-offs. Drinking’s one. Apparently a lot of trust funds don’t activate until 21 or 25, even 30.”

Dean scoffed. “Why would you even know anything about trust funds?” he asked.

“Uh, Stanford, Dean? I can’t tell you how painfully awkward it is to be sitting there on the good graces of a scholarship and hearing a table full of students whine about the wait-time for their daddy’s millions.”

Dean frowned, shrugged, granting the comment due consideration.

“You went to Stanford?” asked Young Dean.

“Yeah,” said Sam, awkwardly aware of the grief it once caused.

“No way,” said Young Dean, a smile breaking out across his face. “How in the hell did you manage that? Boy, you got brains.”

Sam, torn between looking pleased and dyspeptic, gave a weak nod. Here was Dean reacting without John’s presence, without a fight tearing things apart. Maybe it was just that he was a few years younger and it didn’t seem real, maybe it was because he could see things turned out alright and they were together as brothers again. But it was refreshing to see that reaction, for Sam.

Dean just watched Young Dean like he didn’t trust him. He looked away when Young Dean’s attention returned to the rest of the group.

“Hey, that’s another thing going for us,” said Young Dean. “Technically, I never finished high school. That could count for something.”

“You’re going to, though,” said Dean. “You’re gonna get your GED.”

“What good does it do me?” Young Dean asked, challenging Dean more out of nature than out of having something to gain by this. He was hard at work on his GED already and had no plan to abandon it, but now that Dean was saying he _had_ to do it, Young Dean didn’t feel like playing nice. “There some hunt out there comes with an application form, proof of education?”

“It’s the point of the thing,” said Dean. “Quit arguing with me. You get your GED because you get your GED. Nothing I say to you now changes that.”

“Alright,” said Young Dean, backing down like the fight bored him more than anything. “So, what else we got? Never had a bar mitzvah or rumspringa or debutante ball.”

“You are post-puberty,” Cas said with a straight face, like he didn’t even realise it was inherently funny to bring up. “Although from what we can tell in the lore, most of the hunters have not been altogether children.”

“You ain’t a virgin,” Dean said, arms folded over his chest, looking dead across at Young Dean. “They don’t say it outright in the stories, but it might as well be implied.”

“You telling me teenagers weren’t having sex before marriage in the old days?” Young Dean asked. “Hell, they had less time on earth than we do. Probably thought they were lucky to make it to all of fifteen. It’d be worth celebrating.”

“I still think those references to innocence and pure-heartedness were editorial,” said Sam, clearly carrying on an argument from before Cas even whisked Young Dean out of 1998.

“Innocence?” Young Dean broke in, before the fight could start up again. “Well, you picked the wrong guy for that. Fellas, this ain’t gonna work if it’s innocence we’re talking.”

Young Dean caught Cas looking at him, heartbreak in his blue eyes, just a moment before the angel glanced away. Fucking angel. It struck Young Dean that he shouldn’t even be hearing this, with all his heavenly holiness.

“I was just saying, I don’t think it’s meant literally,” said Sam.

“You knew,” Young Dean said, looking across harshly at his older counterpart. “We ain’t pure. Innocent. When were we ever? You’re going to have to go back a long way before you find a Dean that hasn’t killed a man, killed a hundred monsters.”

“I get that,” said Sam, “but when we’re talking about pure-of-heart, there’s no one more dedicated to his cause than you, Dean. Saving people’s lives, risking your own. That’s pretty pure.”

“Pure-of-heart my ass,” said Young Dean, eyes barely leaving his other self. “Why did you even let them bother? You knew this wouldn’t work.”

“I made the exact same arguments as you,” said Dean, voice flat and controlled. “But they talked me around to it and I figure Sammy probably has a point. He usually does.”

“That,” said Sam, pointing at Dean but looking at Young Dean, “is not something your future self says often, but you should adopt it. Seriously.”

“I’m not pure,” said Young Dean again. “Maybe there’s stuff you’ve forgotten in your golden years here, all safe and happy in twenty-fucking-twenty. I’m a little closer to it. I know better, who I really am.”

“I haven’t forgotten jack-shit,” said Dean. “I know everything you’re thinking about right now. I’ve been there, in your head. Now I’m not saying you’re not fucked up. I’m not pretending shit hasn’t happened to you that you wish hadn’t. Things you don’t want to think about, things you don’t want to feel. I still gotta shoulder some of that shit, and other things too. Worse things, some of them. I’m not gonna sit here and tell you it gets easier or you get over it or any of that bull. But you’re a good fighter, even with stains on your soul, and that’s what’s gonna get us through.”

Young Dean pressed his lips tightly together, barely convinced.

“Dean,” Cas spoke up, looking mostly at his contemporary but casting a glance to include Young Dean too. “I’ve seen your soul. It isn’t stained.”

“You’ve seen his soul?” said Young Dean.

“Yes,” said Cas. “When I carried it out of Hell.”

“How, exactly, do I end up in Hell if I’m not a bad person?”

“Bad demon deal,” Dean answered.

“It wasn’t where you were meant to go,” said Cas.

“How isn’t my soul stained?” Young Dean asked Cas, voice breaking. His green eyes implored Cas. Cas knew. Back at Schaffer’s bar, Dean had treated him like a john, couldn’t have been clearer in his intent, still carried sixty-eight dollars in his shirt pocket. It was a cardinal sin of some kind, wasn’t it? Sex without love, befouling the body, disrespecting God’s creation with the low-life pick-ups Dean found in dive bars and alleys.

“That’s enough,” interrupted Dean. He was watching Sam, now. Sam, whose eyes followed the exchange, expression increasingly concerned. Dean had no idea how he would explain his way out of this one.

“Is there… something I should know?” asked Sam. “About why Teen-Dean can’t do this one? Look, if he’s not eligible for… for whatever reason, then maybe we should call this off.”

Dean kept his hard gaze fixed on Sam, like if he tried hard enough he could see into Sam’s head. He didn’t know what conclusions Sam drew from this ambiguous conversation. Dean knew perfectly well what he and his younger self were talking around, what neither of them wanted to put it into words. If neither of them were brave enough to face it directly, then he had to pray they’d been vague enough that Sam couldn’t guess the meaning.

“We’re not getting anywhere with this tonight,” said Dean. “We can’t send Justin Bieber here back till Cas is juiced up again anyway, and that’s gonna take a few days.” He cast a considering glance at Castiel, still looking exhausted and unfit. “Let’s call it a night and revisit tomorrow.”

Sam nodded, pursed lips, but not about to fight it. Then: “Did you just call yourself Justin Bieber?”

* * *

Dean wasn’t going to bed without a beer. Anyone could’ve predicted that. It wasn’t really a surprise that Cas appeared in the kitchen before Dean had a chance to shut himself in his room.

“You should be getting some rest, too,” Dean said, speaking before Cas would have a chance to. “Look at you, you’re sleeping on your feet like a horse. Time to hit the hay, cowboy.”

Cas stood with one arm flat against the doorjamb, like he needed its help staying upright. The fact his eyes were open at all seemed more out of stubborn habit than anything else.

Cas ignored Dean’s advice anyway. “I want to tell him that it will be okay,” he said. Some unspoken ache lived under his words, giving them the tone of confession.

“It wouldn’t be true,” said Dean.

“I want to tell him that he’s a survivor. That no matter how many unlucky circumstances he faces or… or difficult choices he makes, he’s more than just scar tissue and suffering. He has the ability to heal, and hope, and find life’s good things where he can.” Cas tipped his head against the doorframe, lashes dropping over his eyes, gaze on the middle distance between the countertop and the floor. “I don’t see why that wouldn’t be true.”

“Well he wouldn’t believe you,” said Dean.

“You mean that you don’t believe me,” said Cas.

“I’m not sure which of us you’re trying to get through to right now,” said Dean. “Cas, can’t you just leave this? Go power-down to power-up again, would you?”

“I gave him sixty-eight dollars,” said Cas. “All I had in my wallet. Just to get him to sit and listen to me.”

Dean froze. Something niggled at the back of his head.

“He thought I wanted other things. I just thought you should know that. It doesn’t seem fair to pretend otherwise. It feels like lying.”

Sixty-eight dollars. Dean felt the rush of blood in his ears. 1998, Schaffer’s bar, start of November.

“I’ll… go ‘power down,’” said Cas, starting to pull himself away from the door when Dean didn’t respond.

“You gave him sixty-eight dollars,” said Dean. “And he put it in his pocket.” He placed a hand over his chest, the same shirt-pocket that Young Dean used. “And he gets back to Schaffer’s bar that night and he doesn’t know any time passed at all, but he’s got sixty-eight dollars he didn’t have before and doesn’t even know where it came from. And it was you.”

Cas looked uncertain, not wary but cautious. “If I’d had more…”

“Nah,” said Dean, voice raspy. “Nah, it gets us through a week. Then Dad comes back, doesn’t ask how I kept us fed. Doesn’t notice Sam’s got new shoes—used, but they actually fit him—and it was you. It scared me, I’ll admit, but I knew better than to question a bit of good luck. Spent it before it could vanish like leprechaun gold.”

“I can’t tell if this is a happy memory for you or not,” said Cas.

“Not really happy. Or sad. Just a memory,” said Dean, like he didn’t have something stinging in his eyes. “How is it, Cas, you still end up changing my life before I even meet you? Mighta believed in a guardian angel, for a sec.”

“If I could’ve intervened before, if I’d known you—” said Cas.

“You would’ve,” Dean said for him, for once not willingly obtuse to the fact. “I get it. Your free will activation code didn’t kick in till too late for him.” He gave a loose nod of his head towards the sleeping quarters where Young Dean would be.

“You find it hard to look at him and be proud, because you know his burdens and his secrets,” said Cas. “And he’s scared to look at you, as much to find out if he’s succeeded as if he’s failed. But if you were generous to him, if you don’t close yourself off, and let him see you, I think he’d be proud of the man he is.”

“What’s it matter?” Dean asked. “He won’t remember any of it. He won’t remember if I’m nice to him or not.”

“But you will,” said Cas. “And I think that counts for something, too.”

Cas looked ready to leave again, but Dean spoke once more, forever reluctant to give him up, even as he protested over and over that he didn’t care to talk, thought they should rest, would give anything not to be accountable to someone. “Cas?” He had his eyes on the edge of the kitchen sink, able to tell Cas had stopped again in the doorway, but unable to look at him. He pulled himself together enough to continue, doing a terrible job of sounding off-hand as he said, “Sorry if he made you uncomfortable. If he suggested something. He didn’t know you’re a friend.”

Cas sighed, almost spoke, then said, “He didn’t make me uncomfortable. Not like that.”

“You just pitied him,” said Dean. Cas shifted again, searching for a better answer than the true one.

“It’s alright,” said Dean, voice strained. “I pity the poor bastard too.” He finally lifted his cold beer to his mouth, but he paused, turned to the sink. “I’m not thirsty,” he said, dumping out the bottle, setting it empty on the back of the sink to put away tomorrow.

He moved past Cas into the hall, shoulders brushing. He didn’t look back as he said, “Get some shut-eye, Cas, I mean it.”

Cas waited at the doorway, waited until Dean’s door opened then shut again behind him. Waited just in case Dean wanted to say one more thing, draw Cas once more back into their endless orbiting. At last he peeled away from the wall and stumbled to his own room, grace sufficiently depleted from dragging Dean to the present that he welcomed the comfort of bed, of resting his eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> » did Dean directly quote Annie Proulx's _Brokeback Mountain_ in this chapter? yeah, what of it. I have a whole essay on Dean re: Brokeback Mountain just ask me  
> » also, Dean getting his GED is just important to me idk what to tell you  
> » ch. 2 title reference: "Hold Your Head Up" by Argent


	3. visions of your reality

Young Dean woke early because John Winchester trained them to. A military upbringing he doubted he’d ever shake. He suspected grown-up Sam and Dean were shallow sleepers, although perhaps they needed more rest now that they were old. He still made sure to be quiet as possible as he found his way to the angel’s door.

Castiel might not sleep, generally, but after such exhausting time-travel he’d given into his body and mind’s need for rest. He’d shed his shoes, his outer coat, because one did not wear those things in bed. He’d taken off his tie and unbuttoned his shirt. He got under the blanket not for warmth, but because the reassuring weight of it made him feel calm and easy.

Not fully asleep, but meditational, he noticed when his door opened. Young Dean closed it after himself at once. The lamp on Castiel’s bedside table lit the room—Cas hadn’t thought of turning it off.

“Nice place you got here,” Young Dean whispered, looking around at the bare walls, and limited furnishings. “Real homey.”

“I don’t spend much time here,” said Cas, shifting to prop himself up against his headboard, posture still slack and voice a note lower than usual. “Angels don’t sleep.”

“What do you call this, then?”

“Unless they’ve used considerable energy travelling twenty-two years and bringing someone back to the present with them, of course,” said Cas. “What brings you here, Dean?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” said Dean, and he seemed genuine, like he hadn’t expected Cas to ask that question. Hadn’t thought of his reason for sneaking in here, just did it on no account.

“You can take a seat?” said Cas, rubbing at one eye as he dragged himself from the last of his lethargy.

There was a chair at the desk, but when Young Dean accepted Cas’ suggestion, he instead went to the end of the bed, sitting cross-legged, facing Cas. He had holes in the heels of both socks, and one at the toe. He’d slept in a band shirt Dean might’ve actually had back in ‘98, before it had faded and worn down to its current state.

“I guess I wanted to ask some stuff,” said Young Dean, like the reason for being here only just occurred to him. He looked across at the angel in the half-fastened white dress shirt and sleep-ruffled hair. He looked not like an angel at all. He just looked like a borderline respectable man who could use some rest and a shave. But those blue eyes landed on Dean in a way that was perfectly focused, awake and attentive.

“And I don’t think I can go to— Sammy and him, or I guess me, they’re too close to it. But you, you’re… You live here, but you’re not my brother and you’re not me and I think that makes it easier.”

“Of course,” said Cas, and he shifted, mirroring Dean’s pose. The crossed legs, the loose posture. His grey blanket still covered his lap. His shirt looked soft and wrinkled.

“I realise I probably should have asked you more questions before I let you drag me into Future Land,” said Dean.

“We didn’t have an abundance of time,” said Cas. “The longer I stayed in the past, the more taxing the journey back would be.”

“And you can’t return me till you're juiced up again? That’s what it sounded like, from what they said.”

“That’s correct,” said Cas. “Do you want to go back badly?”

“No, it’s not that,” said Dean. His hand traced over a fold in the blanket, pushing the gentle rise of fabric to shift it around without entirely smoothing it out. “Guess I’m just trying to understand how this works. How you work.”

Cas gave a faint nod of his head, not pushing, never assuming he knew what Dean might say or ask.

“You pulled me out of Hell twelve years ago, you said. Why?”

“You were part of a wider plan,” said Castiel, carefully watching Young Dean. “It’s a complicated story. It was just about the last time I followed one of Heaven’s orders.”

“Sam said you were fallen,” said Young Dean.

“Yes,” said Cas.

“Because of me?”

“Because of a lot of reasons,” said Cas. “Mostly through choices I made on my own, but—” Cas’ lips parted faintly. “I never would’ve rebelled against Heaven if I hadn’t met Dean.”

Young Dean’s brow furrowed in, less able to hide his emotions at nineteen than at forty-one.

“That’s a good thing, Dean,” said Cas, his gaze imploring. “I may have caused many problems because of the things I did, I don’t discount that, but I never would have saved so many people without discovering free will. I’ve made the choice to help, to align myself with Dean and Sam and make the right choice for the world, again and again. I have to hope that balances out the red in my ledger.”

“You’ve stayed with them,” said Young Dean. “For twelve whole years.”

“As much as possible,” said Cas. “I’d have stayed more, if I could.”

“What do you mean by that?”

Cas looked uncertain, not sure how much to say, or where to begin. “There have been interruptions. Missions and causes that were mine to take on. My unintended absences. Possession or exile or death.”

“Wait, you’ve died?”

Cas smiled sadly. “A few times,” he said. Voice soft, almost apologetic, though this Dean couldn’t understand why.

“Man,” said Young Dean, leaning back and rubbing his hands over his face. “The future is _fucked up_. Okay. Is everyone going through this same crazy bullshit as me and my brother? Everybody got an angel wingman these days? Hah, wingman.”

“The Winchesters have a uniquely magnetic draw for catastrophe,” said Cas. “And you’ve made that joke before. Or, you will make that joke. Again and again.”

“I couldn’t tell if I still had a sense of humour. Thought maybe I forgot it in Hell.”

“I rebuilt you exactly as you were,” said Cas. “However, alongside your inappropriate comments, love of Westerns, and absurd amount of media references, there is your fundamental distrust towards self-reflection. Nothing could be more agonizing than looking at yourself head-on. You’re both trying to avoid each other desperately.”

“You weren’t kidding about my soul, then,” said Young Dean, and he seemed finally to have circled down to the question he wanted to ask all along. “You’ve really seen it?”

“Yes,” said Castiel.

“And you aren’t lying about it being… not dirty? I mean, it’s not ruined?”

“Dean, I wouldn’t lie to you,” said Cas. “Any version of you. And certainly not about something like that. You’re a good man.”

“I don’t think… I don’t think I deserve to go to Hell,” said Young Dean, frowning, discovering the truth even as he spoke it. “But I ain’t pure. _You_ know that.” Dean still had Cas’ money. He knew he should offer it back, but he had a hard time making that sacrifice when he kept thinking of Sammy back at the motel in 1998.

“Purity isn’t all it’s cracked up to be,” said Castiel. “I haven’t seen anyone live a blameless or unblemished life. You do things for the right reasons. For your brother. For people who need saving.”

“Did he ever tell you about it?” Young Dean asked Cas. “Or did he not have to?”

“We never discussed it,” said Cas. “I don’t know that he’s told anyone.”

“I had this idea that… that maybe not far in the future I’d close the door on this for good,” said Young Dean. “Not have to remember any of it. Not have to remember who I am, or, I guess, was. I’d get over it and go on to have a life no one could sneer at. Nothing to hide. Have a girl—a wife, I mean—and a place that’s mine, a family. I can’t say I’m thrilled knowing I’m a crusty old bachelor. It feels now like maybe that door never closes after all.”

“I wouldn’t be able to say,” Cas responded after a moment, eyes on the bed sheets between them. “Of the things that haunt Dean, I don’t know where everything ranks. But he has love, and he has family, and he’s made this place his own.” Cas looked around absently. “Though I wouldn’t mind a home with windows, someday.”

There was a sound from the hall, someone muttering and fast feet on the floor. “Cas?” A knock on the door, even if the handle was already turning. “Cas, you up? Teen-Dean’s mi—” Dean cut himself off when Young Dean craned to look over his shoulder.

Dean stopped for a moment, then called back to the hallway, “He’s here, Sam. He’s with Cas.”

Sam called something back to the effect of ‘Alright,’ then ‘Coffee.’

“What’s with the little slumber party?” Dean asked, letting the door hang open behind him, but not moving any further into the room.

“Dean wanted to talk,” said Cas.

“Teen-Dean,” said Dean. “Teen-Dean wanted to talk.” He looked at Young Dean, jaw still tight. “I don’t remember being so in touch with my _feelings_ back then.”

“Oh fuck off, would you?” said Young Dean. “Why’s everything so dramatic with you?”

“This is absurd,” said Cas, getting out from under his blankets to stand, to cross between the two Deans.

“He’s supposed to be resting,” Dean said, pointing a fierce finger at Cas. “You have something you gotta say, you come to me about it.”

“Because you’re so reasonable,” Young Dean sniped back.

“This is,” said Cas, fully between them now, “an extraordinary argument that I’m sure could circle back on itself for decades, but I wouldn’t mind if we saved ourselves the time and carried on. Dean, you need coffee.” It was too early for him to deal with this sans caffeine. “You’ll feel better. Teen-Dean, I imagine that goes for you as well.” Cas gestured his head towards the kitchen, and Young Dean unfolded from his spot at the end of the bed. He passed the other two men to make for the kitchen, seemingly better for being out of Dean’s presence.

Dean stayed where he was, just watching Young Dean disappear down the hall.

“Be nice to him,” Cas reminded Dean, soft and futile.

“He’s got a mouth on him,” said Dean, temper still up. “No wonder my Dad hit the limit with him some days.”

Cas studied Dean for a moment before saying, “You like his give-‘em-hell attitude. Deep down. You just aren’t used to being on this side of it.”

“What was he doing here, Cas?” Dean asked, finally looking away from the hall.

“He wanted to talk,” Cas repeated.

“Why couldn’t he talk to me or Sammy? He likes Sam.”

“He thought I might be more objective in my answers,” said Cas. “He doesn’t know me like he knows you and Sam.”

“What was he asking?”

“He wanted to know about his soul. He asked how I fell. It was thoughtful of him.”

“To ask how you fell?”

“He has no real connection to me. The bond that was established between you and I in Hell doesn’t apply to him. It was nice that he came to talk anyway.”

“You think I only talk to you because we’ve got some crazy Hell-bond?” Dean asked.

Cas shrugged a shoulder, despite the consequential magnitude Dean saw in what he asked. “There was no way of knowing for sure how that affected our link to one another. Maybe if you met me some other way, on a hunt or on the street or in a bar like Schaffer’s, you’d have hated me. Or just… never cared.”

“I’d still care,” Dean said, immediately on the defensive.

Cas favoured him with the ghost of a smile.

“Come have some coffee,” said Dean.

“Let me just—” Cas started to turn, angling towards the chair his coat had been folded over.

“Why don’t you leave the armour?” said Dean. “We never see you out of uniform like this.”

Cas turned a curious look back at Dean but offered no words, leaving Dean scrambling again. “Unless,” said Dean, “unless you’re cold or something.”

“I don’t feel cold,” said Cas. With that he passed by Dean through the door, his white shirt rumpled from sleep, only half tucked-in to the waist of his black slacks. Dean followed at once, not a step behind, like some invisible string pulled him after.

Sam and Young Dean glanced to the doorway when they appeared. Sam returned mindlessly to scraping almond butter onto his toast, but Young Dean’s eyes lingered on the pair. Dean battled down the desire to glower back in return. _Be nice_ , Cas said. It was hard when Young Dean managed, by his mere presence, to get on Dean’s last nerve. The best Dean had it in him to do was just ignore him.

“So when do we go griffin hunting?” Young Dean asked, reaching for the coffee cream, only to be stopped by Dean seizing it first to doctor his own coffee. Young Dean had to roll his eyes.

“We’re looking at tomorrow night,” Sam answered. “We need Cas at full power to zap you out if it gets hairy.”

“What? You’re using Cas like some angelic life-preserver?”

“We don’t know if this will work at all,” said Sam, “but if it doesn’t, then we need you out of there and back in your correct timeline.”

“Even if I don’t get the egg?”

“The egg is important, but not as important as you staying alive,” said Sam. “So that you can turn into… this guy.” He gestured with his almond-butter-smeared knife at Dean.

“That means Cas takes me away and leaves you two with a deadly animal you can’t kill. One that’s likely pretty pissed off,” said Young Dean, and already he was winding up into that self-sacrificing, headfirst-into-danger attitude that Sam and Cas knew all too well. “I get that you want to ‘preserve the timeline’ and all that, but I don’t want you treating me with kid gloves. You’re gonna call it too soon, I can already tell. If I do this, you’ve gotta treat me as an equal. You gotta let me risk my neck and trust that I can handle myself. I don’t want Castiel pulling me out of the fight just cause the griffin looked at me wrong.”

“You know what, you’re right,” Dean said, surprising everyone, most of all Young Dean, who looked up at him with wide eyes. His bitter edge evaporated. Dean took a sip from his coffee in the protracted silence, then said, “You two will bail on the plan if he gets as much as a scratch on him. But he’s not a kid. We can take the training wheels off.”

“I can’t believe there are two of you,” muttered Sam, rubbing a hand over his mouth. “ _Two of you_ advocating for your total disregard for personal safety.”

“We already had this argument anyway,” said Dean, shrugging one shoulder. “Before Cas even went after him. He’s legal age to make his own decisions. That was a sticking point, if I recall.”

“Sometimes there’s a difference between legal age and asking too much,” said Sam. “Jeez, you know, he’s younger than Claire? And you didn’t exactly react with enthusiasm when she started hunting.”

“Claire didn’t have years of experience under her belt. Under _Dad_. You know what that was like, Sam,” said Dean. “That was completely different.”

“Who’s Claire?” Young Dean asked. “She hot?”

“That’s sick, Dean,” said Dean. “She’s like our kid.”

“We have a daughter?” Young Dean asked.

“No, she’s like… she’s Cas’... You know what? Yeah. She’s family is what she is.”

Young Dean nodded, straight-faced, taking a drink from his coffee cup as he absorbed that reaction. He knew very well what that word, ‘family,’ meant coming out of his own mouth. It wasn’t something used lightly. Young Dean cleared his throat and looked over at Cas. “You haven’t weighed in,” he said. “What would you do? Pull the ripcord on Sam’s order or wait for mine?”

Cas cupped his hands around the mug of coffee he had yet to take a drink from. His gaze attentively followed each thread of the conversation, but he hadn’t expected to be called on. Apparently three Winchesters in one room changed the typical pattern of argument. Clearly uncomfortable, Cas still met Young Dean’s eye with a steady gaze. “Maybe everyone would feel more assured if they could see your current level of skill. There’s a gym in here. A bit of fight training will do everyone good.”

It was a non-answer, but it was also a solution. Cas took a deep drink from his black coffee, eyes flicking around the room, landing on Dean last and staying there.

“Fighting against a couple of old geezers like you two?” said Young Dean, a grin angling up the corners of his mouth. “You’re going to regret starting this.”

Dean bit his cheek to keep a smile from betraying him. “No we’re not,” he said.

“Let’s save the bluster for the gym,” said Sam. “Can we hold off till after noon?”

“Nothing to me,” said Young Dean with a shrug, although being so free of an agenda left him antsy. “But if I’ve gotta hang around here till tomorrow night, I need to get out of this bunker. How do I even know I really am in 2020? Other than your fancy tech, I haven’t seen jack.”

“Jack’s visiting Jody and the girls,” said Cas. “I wish you could meet him. You’re close in age.”

“Jack’s three,” said Dean. “And that’s not what Teen-Dean meant.”

“Three-ish,” said Cas. He looked over at Young Dean. “Sometimes he’s three and sometimes he’s eternal, but he _looks_ your age. He’s wise beyond his years.”

“Teen-Dean doesn’t need to meet Jack, Cas,” said Dean. “He’d be a bad influence, anyway. Believe me.”

“No one’s answered my question,” said Young Dean. “If I step out the door up there, I’m not gonna find some irradiated nuclear hellscape, right?”

“We’ll get groceries,” said Sam, easy and direct. They were all learning you couldn’t leave too many openings for Dean and Young Dean to get going. Given the barest hint of an opportunity, the two of them would talk past each other with escalating degrees of aggression. “You can come with me into town and see what the world is like. Or what Kansas is like at least.”

“Wait, we’re in Kansas?” said Young Dean.

“Yeah, Lebanon,” said Sam. “It’s the geographical centre of the States, which is why the Men of Letters built the bunker here. Why?”

“Oh, it’s just, you know,” said Young Dean, shifting in his seat. “Dad sort of avoids this place. How far is Lebanon from Lawrence, anyway?”

“Three and a half hours or so,” said Sam. “Depends who’s driving.”

“You know, I’ve never been back there?”

“Yeah, kid,” said Dean. “We know.”

“Right,” said Young Dean, immediately shot down. Of course these people would know everything about him. Dean especially. What he’d lived, what he’d done, what he desired. The thwarted, complicated sense of homesickness he got just thinking about Lawrence.

“You do go back there, one day,” said Dean. “A case at… A case at our old house.”

Young Dean’s expression became more complicated, more questioning. Like he could already fill in the blanks, but didn’t want to know. Dean seemed to realise his mistake and said, “You’ll get there in time. No use worrying about it now.”

Dean got up from the table with that, poured another cup of coffee, and left the room. Left silence in his wake. Cas finally rose from his seat, too. “I think I’ll do some more research on the sword we’re after,” he said. “Griffins, too.” He looked at Young Dean. “Make sure Sam doesn’t go overboard on fresh produce at the store. Get things you and Dean will eat, too.”

Young Dean gave one cursory nod. His eyes followed Castiel out of the room, then after a moment dragged over to Sam. He put on the toughest face he had. “So what’s up with those two?” he asked.

Sam very deliberately took a long sip of his coffee, the cup nearly empty and likely quite cold. He swallowed it down and said, “What’s up in what way?” In an attitude of feigned innocence, his eyebrows climbed higher on his forehead than strictly needed.

“You’ve got this Eileen chick,” said Young Dean. “But Dean’s not married and there’s this live-in angel who’s held my soul in his hands. Then there’s these kids, Claire and Jack, who it seems like you’re hiding from me on purpose—”

“The kids thing is complicated,” Sam cut in. “Claire… Cas lives in the body of her dead dad, so that’s a whole thing, but her and Dean really get along. And Jack’s all of ours. Cas and Dean and me. It’s not the suburban-values, Tuesday-soccer-practice, PTA-fundraiser, apple-pie sort of set-up, but it’s family. And, actually, there’s no shortage of pie.”

Sam’s awkward summary unloaded more implausible facts than Young Dean was quite prepared to handle, which silenced him for a moment. When he worked himself up to speak again, it was that sticking point, “But you’ve got Eileen.”

“Yeah,” said Sam.

“And Dean’s got Cas.”

“I don’t know if I’m the one you should be talking to about this, Dean,” said Sam.

“Yeah, ‘cause the other guy’s so communicative,” Young Dean scoffed. He folded his arms over his middle, shaking his head and looking down at the floor. Like he was the one burdened by the weight of ages. “It’s just not the life I pictured, you know? I thought I’d… I dunno. Grow out of it.”

Sam swallowed hard. “So. Uh,” he said. “This isn’t. A conversation that we’ve had.”

Young Dean looked up at him swiftly, like he’d been caught in a deliberate trap. “But you just said— Cas and Dean—” He dragged his hands over his face, groaning.

“I mean, I’m… _totally_ supportive,” said Sam, with slightly too much gusto. As if he’d been prepared for this moment a long time but hadn’t expected today to be his window. “And I would’ve been, at _any time_ if you wanted to talk about it. But he hasn’t—” He gestured over one shoulder to where Dean had last disappeared. “He hasn’t… come out.”

Young Dean groaned again, standing up and pressing the heels of his palms against his eyes as he paced away. “Well _fuck_ ,” he said.

“And whether it’s both guys and girls in general or whether it’s just… just Cas, that’s all… I just want you to be happy, Dean.”

One more exasperated sound from Young Dean obliged Sam to cut himself off before he dug the grave any deeper. Young Dean finally turned around on a heel, and because he couldn’t exactly take back all the damage he’d already done, there was little left for him but to keep diving in headfirst, picking at the scab. “So there’s nothing happening between him and the angel?”

“Honestly, I sometimes don’t know for sure,” Sam began to say, but then he changed tracks. “No, I don’t think there’s been. But there’s something. Between them. Nobody talks about it, least of all either of them, but it’s not some normal buddy-buddy friendship they’ve got. They’re so… so _intense_ about each other.”

“Well this is just great,” said Young Dean, shoving a hand through his hair, shaking his head, staring off into nowhere.

“I don’t see why _you’re_ so upset about it,” said Sam. “It sounds like it’s some reassurance to you that Dean hasn’t done anything about it.”

“Reassurance?” Young Dean echoed. “I’m forty-one, in love with my best friend, and in the closet about it. Raising kids with him and then living down the hall from him, separate bedrooms, like some goddam monk. I’m a scared, spineless piece of shit. I’m supposed to find that reassuring?”

“You might wanna keep your voice down,” Sam urged. “They’re both in the bunker.”

“Maybe they should hear me,” said Young Dean, wound into a righteous fury. “It might get their fucking heads out of their asses.”

“Believe me, you have no idea what a relief it would be if they did.”

“Fuck, Sammy,” said Young Dean, slumping into his chair again, the dramatic fit sapping out of him. “I’m pathetic. I failed you.”

“What? Why would you think you failed me?”

“I was supposed to set a good example.”

“You have, Dean. You always did. This isn’t— You think I care if you’re bi?”

Young Dean made a face, eyes pressing closed. “It’s not about that,” he said, even though it absolutely was. “Our lives weren’t normal, but I sometimes thought, once the Yellow-Eyed Demon was dead, I was supposed to show you the way. You don’t even remember what it was like before being on the road, so I was supposed to do it right. Be normal.”

“Our lives will never be normal, Dean,” said Sam. “Yellow Eyes has been gone for more than a decade, and we’ve tried normal. Both of us. It doesn’t work. Because there’s normal and then there’s real. Dean and Cas? It’s absolutely not normal, the amount of time they’ve been dancing around each other, but it’s sure as hell real. I think they both know that, deep down.”

Young Dean turned his cheek against his forearm, still looking nowhere. “He seems nice,” he said at last.

“You mean Cas?”

“Mmhm.” Young Dean’s shoulders lifted in a heavy sigh. “And Dean, future-me, he knows how he feels. He’s gotta. I’ve seen the way he acts. Protective and jealous over _me_ talking to him, when we’re the same damn person.” Another smaller sigh. “I like Cas,” he said. “I barely even know who he is, but it’s like, I trust him. He doesn’t have to give me any proof or reason why or nothing. Just like that. He says something, like he won’t let me die, and I just know I won’t die. And there is _nothing_ I ever felt so certain of in my life.”

“Cas is good people,” Sam said quietly, carefully watching his (strangely younger) older brother.

“Dean’s gonna kill me for telling you all this shit,” said Young Dean.

“Yeah, I might save reopening this conversation till after you’re gone,” said Sam. “Because you’re heading into the practice ring with him in a few hours and I know you think you’re hot shit, but Dean’s probably fought and killed more adversaries than any living hunter and he’s _good_. You don’t stand a snowball’s chance against him, so don’t take it hard when he beats you. Let’s just not give him any reason to lose restraint.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> » some new tags for the new chapter, as an fyi  
> » ch. 3 title reference: "Visions of Your Reality" by Ultimate Spinach


	4. you're playing with fire

The Deans met in the gym that afternoon. Sam and Dean didn’t train formally; they worked out a little between hunts, at best, or resorted to a sparring match when one or the other needed to channel out pent-up energy. Although John Winchester’s military experience informed their hand-to-hand combat tactics, their style of fighting was mostly practical. It skewed itself to the shape of a brawl rather than a boxing match. Fights were about survival before they were about control.

Still, Dean didn’t want to do any damage to Young Dean. He had to be fit to fight in the coming days. The purpose of this was to see where he stood, and give him some pointers. Years of experience taught Dean maneuvres that worked for him specifically, things Young Dean might not have worked out yet. He’d forget it all later, have to learn it again the hard way, but Dean could at least send Young Dean into this fight with a greater advantage.

So he taped up his fists, and helped Young Dean to do the same. Young Dean asked was this really necessary, did he go on hunts with securely wrapped hands and a safety helmet now, but Dean just said there was no point getting a joint out of line when they could avoid it.

“Huh,” Dean said, tipping his head to the side as he wrapped Young Dean’s right hand. “Forgot about that.”

“About what?”

“How crooked these fingers were,” he said, winding the tape methodically between fingers that had broken more than once and never healed quite proper.

“What do you mean, were?”

“Cas fixed all that stuff up,” said Dean. He held up his right hand and wiggled his fingers, which were pretty well-aligned. “Scars and bullet wounds and all that. There’s been new ones since, but if Cas is around at the time he sets it right.”

“He got magic healing powers or something?” said Young Dean, and it was meant to sound sarcastic.

“Yeah, exactly,” Dean answered easily. Finished with the tape, he stepped back. “Okay. Let’s see what you got.”

Young Dean shifted into a ready stance, hands rising and hovering, but not yet tightened into fists. “So when I lay you flat out,” he said, “I don’t have to worry about leaving permanent damage. Good to know.”

“We’re not bringing Cas in here to heal a few knocks from sparring,” said Dean. He circled more slowly, watching Young Dean, easily bobbing clear of two attempted jabs. “He needs his energy to get you back where you belong.”

“I won’t fault you if you change your mind after we’ve gone a few rounds,” said Young Dean. He threw a few more punches, which Dean blocked immediately. Dean didn’t strike out in turn.

“Well you’ve got confidence, I’ll give you that,” said Dean, the smile twisting his mouth sharper than Young Dean’s.

Young Dean pressed forward, trying to get on the inside, where he knew his strength lay. But Dean knew that too, guessing Young Dean would favour that approach and never leaving an opening. He blocked every move without making any offensive jabs himself. Young Dean grit his teeth, spending effort but gaining nothing. “C’mon, old man! Fight me!”

“I don’t have to,” said Dean. “You haven’t done anything surprising yet. You keep announcing your moves.”

“That so?” Young Dean tried to fool Dean, feinting a swipe from one direction, then going low to get underneath Dean’s raised hands. Dean cut the action short again, then caught him with a check hook, just a single, sharp strike that used Young Dean’s momentum to land the blow while Dean stepped safely back. Just enough to put Young Dean off his game, making him retreat back a step without leaving damage. It was startling more than anything. That move came viper-fast, at least to Young Dean’s eye.

He wasn’t going to be out-fought by a man twice his age. “You’re not even getting into it!” accused Young Dean, swinging forward again with his trusted right hook.

Dean caught his wrist, stopping the punch before it came close to even grazing him.

“You’re pulling too far back ahead of that swing,” said Dean. “And you’re striking too high. You should aim here.” He lowered Young Dean’s wrist so that his fist hovered at the correct spot. Young Dean took the chance for a sudden jab with his left fist while Dean was having this teaching moment, but that was caught too. So Young Dean went for the legs with his own in order to trip Dean up, but next thing he was face-down on the floor of the gym.

“We were scrappy,” said Dean, almost fond, getting his knee out of Young Dean’s back and standing straight again. He stepped back a few paces as Young Dean scrambled to his feet. He got right back into his boxing stance, back heel raised from the ground, as ready to dodge as attack.

“Saving your energy, old man?” he spat out. “Can’t you get it up any more?”

“Careful, this is _your_ future you’re talking to,” said Dean.

Young Dean swept forward for another aggressive front, bringing all the intensity he had with him. Dean engaged him this time, blocking and thwarting and weaving away from Young Dean’s offensive ploys. When he did make to strike back, Young Dean dodged and countered in time. It was the first moment since they started fighting that Dean looked at all pleased, and Young Dean crowed with it.

“Thought you had me there, didn’t you?” he said, bouncing on his feet, a merry, bloodthirsty look in his eyes. “I’m just getting warmed up, you know.”

“That’s at least a little reassuring,” said Dean. “Hate to think this is how you fight on a hunt.”

Young Dean darted forward again, but Dean still seemed to predict every move. Worse, he hadn’t even broken a sweat. He was just picking off punches like they were nothing to him. This itself more obnoxious than any amount of chirping from Dean.

It was only through another dirty move that Young Dean got the chance to grapple, attempting to get Dean to the ground. Dean threw him off too quickly again. He was a little stronger than Young Dean, sure, but they were the same weight class and Young Dean was getting pissed. This was supposed to be an easy fight: Youth versus Experience. He was angry, though, and he could use that. Anger was an old habit, rising readily under his skin as he lunged forward again, careless now of whether he got hurt. It would be worth it to win.

“Oh there it is,” said Dean, thwarting another hit. “Gloves just came off.”

“Just _fight me_ , asshole,” growled Young Dean.

“I know what you’re thinking right now,” said Dean, circling Young Dean, blocking his hits as they came, not breaking the rhythm of his speech for a moment. “You think you’re young and can bounce back from a hit. You think you can just wear me out. You think you’ve got speed on your side. That when I try to throw a punch, I’ll be slower, just slow enough to leave an opening, like the old guys you’re used to fighting in the back alleys of bars. But here’s the thing…”

That’s when he did it. When he went from lazily parrying blows to a full-on affront. It was like he’d flipped a switch, became a machine. Young Dean barely had time to react, couldn’t strike out because he was so busy trying to prevent blows from landing. The moves were familiar, all his own, but harder and smarter and quicker than he’d ever delivered them before. Dean clipped him more than once, kept throwing him off balance so that Young Dean was stumbling just to stay on his feet, let alone find a stance with any power to it. When he tried to get a good punch in, Dean caught him harder than before. In a flash he had Young Dean’s arm twisted up behind his back, his whole body turned, and Dean stood just behind him, his condescending snarl in Young Dean’s ear.

“Here’s the thing,” he said. “I’m forty-one and in the best shape of my _life_. Now I can’t get you to where I am overnight, but if you actually _listen to me_ you might get through this griffin fight without taking any damage, and a helluva lot faster.”

“I don’t need your fucking advice,” Young Dean spat, because he could barely think; the strain Dean put on his arm _hurt_ and made him grit his teeth rather than admit to the pain.

“You know, you’re not just arrogant, you’re a full-on idiot,” said Dean.

“Yeah, well,” said Young Dean. “At least I’m not a fucking coward.” He felt the shift as that landed. Dean didn’t let him go, but the hold changed slightly.

“Oh yeah? How’s that, exactly?”

Young Dean laughed, teeth still bared. “You think I can’t see your little crush on Cas? The one you’re too much of a pussy to do anything about?”

Dean pushed Young Dean fiercely away from him. “You’re full of shit,” he said, though he no longer had the cool, superior tone from earlier. “You don’t know—”

“I know you,” said Young Dean, half-manic laughter rising out of his throat. “I _am_ you. But hell, I’m embarrassed about it now. This is what I have to turn into? Some angry loser who won’t admit he—”

Dean surged forward, pinning Young Dean hard against the wall, his arm a cross-bar over his chest. “And what about you, huh? You tried to _hustle_ my best _friend_. You know what that makes you, right?”

Whether at the accusation or the rough actions, Young Dean had the grace to look shocked for a moment. Scared, almost. But then he swallowed and the look in his eyes cooled. Like he’d checked out. “Go ahead,” said Young Dean. “Say it. You’re only saying it to yourself, after all.”

Dean’s face twisted with contempt, with self-hatred. He didn’t say it, not out loud, but it hung between them all the same. _A whore_. Years of difference between them, but the lines carved like scars in their minds led to the same place. Crooked fingers healed, but some things were beyond what even an angel could save.

Dean shoved away from Young Dean, pacing back across the gym. “I’m done with you,” he said. “I’ll get Sam in here. He can show you what you need to know.”

Young Dean took the opportunity while Dean’s back was turned to race forward, to get the jump on him. It was messy and uncoordinated. For a few moments Dean genuinely wrestled with him, then Young Dean was flat on his back on the floor, half-winded.

When Dean left him in the dust this time, Young Dean didn’t try to follow.

* * *

A couple hours later Dean entered his room only to find Young Dean standing at his dresser, tentatively raising a bottle of cologne to his nose and giving it an experimental sniff.

“You know what? I like this,” he said.

“Yeah,” said Dean. “Guess you would.” Despite the simmering antipathy towards his younger self, he’d cooled off some. He flared up in anger sometimes, but he didn’t like drawn-out grudges. And he hated giving apologies. That went for Young Dean too. Dean didn’t have to ask to know that they both wanted to move on without the whole reconciliation bit, mutually electing to ignore how tense things got back in the gym.

Young Dean put on some of the cologne, applying it just the way Dean still did these days. He paused for another moment of consideration, then gave a satisfied nod. “I needed some clothes after I showered,” he explained. “And thought, what’s yours is mine, right?” He still had a damp sheen to his hair. He looked younger than ever to Dean, given that at nineteen he was slighter and didn’t fill out his clothes the same. Dean was still lean, but Young Dean was fresh out of his last growth spurt, and didn’t eat enough besides. Fresh from the shower, his skin just looked young in that rosy, elastic way that youth takes for granted.

Young Dean placed the cologne back exactly where it had been. Because he knew Dean didn’t like his things messed with. He kept talking, because Dean wasn’t doing anything to fill the silence. “Sammy’s gotten good at fighting, man, y’know?” He looked over at Dean, and it was an olive branch, really. They could agree on Sammy. “I can’t believe he grew up and— He kicked my ass in there.”

“He’s come a long way,” said Dean.

“He gave me some pointers that helped,” said Young Dean, picking up a photo of Mary, then another one of Sam and Dean.

“So you’re in for sure?” Dean asked.

“I don’t know why you guys keep asking me if I’m sure,” said Young Dean. “Like you really think I might back out. When I agreed to leave 1998, my mind was pretty made up then.”

“Yeah. Yeah, I guess it was.” Dean wasn’t one for reneging on promises, backing down from fights. Never had been.

The sleeve of an LP sitting on the turntable caught Young Dean’s eye. “No way,” he said. “I’ve been looking everywhere for this.” He picked it up reverently, angling the cover to catch the light.

“Yeah, well. You find it,” said Dean. He unfolded his arms, giving up his standoffishness at last and coming over to stand beside Young Dean. “It’s a good album. You can put it on.”

Young Dean carefully took the record out of its sleeve, briefly admiring the condition. He set the needle down with a practiced hand and Dean thought for a moment that maybe he wasn’t so bad. Maybe he wasn’t such a fuck-up.

Young Dean lifted his head and met Dean’s eyes. The effect was uncanny. They were the same height, which still felt wrong somehow, like Young Dean should be smaller and not grown-up. Standing side-by-side, somehow the intervening years emphasized how little had changed.

Young Dean looked back down at the spinning record and said, “Cas came by. I think he was thinking he’d find you there.”

“Well he did. In a way. He found you.” Dean turned from Young Dean, like he didn’t really care.

“I don’t think that’s the same to him,” said Young Dean. Neither of them said anything further, and Dean was about to leave. Young Dean spoke up again. “I approve of him. For the record. If that matters to you at all.”

“You _approve_ of him?” said Dean.

“I mean that I can see he’s something… something special. Maybe even clearer than you can.”

“You don’t know what you’re—”

“Don’t tell me I don’t know what I’m talking about,” said Young Dean. He didn’t argue with anger, but with the blinding sincerity of youth. “Believe me, I had my reservations at first and this wasn’t the life I pictured having in the future. Hell, I figured I’d be dead by your age. But I’m not, and maybe being out of time has me thinking of all that gets wasted. And for what? Because I’m stuck thinking I’m supposed to be one type of man? Because I’ve made up all these rules about what is and isn’t allowed? What counts and what doesn’t? I don’t know who you’re afraid of disappointing, but if it’s your past self and old ideas of the man you thought you’d be one day, then I’m saying walk free from that shit because I don’t fucking care. I don’t want to be miserable! You got that? I can tell. I can tell that I put up with a lot of shit over the years to come. I didn’t get so good at fighting because life was all tea parties and county fairs. I mean, I go to Hell! And that’s barely the start of it. So if I have to wade through all that misery and pain, I don’t want to add being a sad sack over my love life onto it.”

Dean couldn’t say anything. He wore a look, dark and wary, like Young Dean’s words were just the warning signs of a rabid animal. And part of him wondered whether the intensity was just the last vestiges of regular teenage dramatics, or if he’d lost something of his old passion somewhere along the way. Worn it down, stamped it out. Did it on purpose.

“I know Dad would never approve,” said Young Dean. “I know he’d hate me for it. But he isn’t around now. And I know you miss him; I know I would. But we can’t keep doing things for his sake when this isn’t his shit to deal with.”

“I don’t get it, man,” Dean said, voice deep and quiet and half-caught in his throat. “You’re saying all this now, but when you go back to ‘98, forgetting all this ever happened, that’s not how you feel. You spend one day in the future and suddenly you’re all enlightened? Because I remember _years_ of slogging through shit, hating yourself, hiding things, acting the way you think you’re supposed to and hoping that will make it real.”

“Yeah, well. This whole Charles Dickens Ghost of Christmas Future bullshit is a bit of an eye-opener, let me tell you that,” said Young Dean. “I’ve never been forced to have an honest-to-god, literal conversation with myself about any of this.”

“I don’t—”

“Plus. It’s Cas,” said Young Dean. It shut Dean up again at once. “I know I— I’ve known him for a few hours, total. And I don’t pretend I have any idea what you’ve been through with him. But there’s something else about him, man.” Young Dean’s voice almost quivered, fighting the inability to express just what it was. “Like just standing near him is grounding and calm and electric all at once. I keep wanting to make up excuses to talk to him, just to be around him. Nothin’ else. Just that the whole room seems a little bigger and brighter when he’s in it.”

Dean kept his arms folded. “That’s the gayest thing I ever heard.” His brow furrowed. “Or. Said?” The complicated question of whether or not Dean, in the present, had truly said the words Young Dean just spoke was too messy to pursue for long. “Both,” he decided.

“I’m getting sort of pissed that I won’t remember this,” said Young Dean. “I mean, do I feel like I need to wash my brain after all this? Yeah, absolutely. But I’d kill just to have a chance to live it all differently. Do it for my sake, Dean.”

“Yeah, here’s the thing. _Dean_. It’s not going to happen. Cas isn’t— Angels don’t— If he wanted it he’d have let me know _something_ by now. Some kind of hint. Any. But he hasn’t, and he won’t, because he doesn’t. End of story. Run credits. Go home.”

Young Dean stared for a long moment, a look that brought into question the chasm between two identical minds at different stages; twinned drives with differing stakes. “I guess you’d know,” said Young Dean, turning away at last to leave the room.

“You got nothing to worry about,” said Dean. “You got plenty of good times ahead. There’s no shortage of that.”

“But I still end up here,” said Young Dean over his shoulder. He left the door open when he departed.

Dean looked around. He didn’t even remember what he came in here for in the first place. He didn’t know if that made him old or just distracted. Looking at Young Dean made him feel about a hundred. Talking to him was worse. All his yearning and aspirations. Dean lifted the needle from the record and powered off the turntable, gave up on remembering what he came for, and returned to the hallway.

Phone charger! Damn—right—of course. Phone charger.

He charged his phone in the kitchen as he started to cook. Dean didn’t like having Young Dean loose in the bunker, but someone had to make dinner that night and if Young Dean had any sense he’d be doing griffin research. Hopefully with Sam, not with Cas. That just felt safer. When Dean gave the call for dinner—a perfunctory “Grub’s up!”—the three men came from different areas altogether.

“Starving,” said Young Dean.

“Tell me there’s a vegetable in this,” said Sam.

Cas paused, head following as Young Dean crossed by his path. He angled his head in a curious tilt. “Is that Dean’s cologne?”

Young Dean answered with a mild yet self-satisfied smile. “Is it that bad, angel?”

“No,” said Cas after a moment’s contemplation. “It has a comforting familiarity.” And, because he had a penchant for saying confounding statements without any apparent awareness of their impact, he gave his attention to finding his seat and missed the expressive look Young Dean directed at Dean. _Come on, man_ , it said.

Dean responded with a stern, _Don’t go there_. They were, if nothing else, adept at nonverbal communication, even if they were dismal when it came to real words.  


* * *

Dean and Sam had something to talk about privately after dinner, something to do with this special sword and Sam’s girlfriend Eileen. She’d done something, Young Dean worked out. She got herself into trouble, which wasn’t like her, and getting this sword from the Arimaspoi would be a critical assist. The only thing they knew that might help her. That’s what made getting the griffin egg so important. That’s why they pushed Cas to the brink of his capacities to pluck Young Dean from his own time.

Young Dean wasn’t supposed to know any of this. None of it had been said directly. He wasn’t an idiot, but if they wanted to treat him like one then sure, go on and underestimate him.

They kept saying if he changed his mind about the mission it was fine. If he couldn’t get the egg for any reason, it was okay, and certainly not worth his life. They’d just find another way. But it wasn’t that simple or they’d have done something else first, anything but this. Young Dean wouldn’t change his mind. And he wouldn’t fail.

He went to the library. Cas sat at the table, arms folded and shoulders sloped forward, bent over a book. He glanced up when Young Dean entered.

“Hello, Dean,” he said.

Young Dean gave a small nod in return, sweeping his gaze over the books on the table. “Which of these has the most on griffins?” he asked.

“This one,” said Cas, flipping back a couple of pages in the book he’d been reading, then sliding it across the table. “Here, I’ve read it over more than once.”

“Thanks,” said Young Dean. He took the book, then crossed over to one of the cozier looking armchairs. He sat with his legs crossed under him, the book balanced easily on his lap. The chair kept him in Castiel’s line of sight, and Young Dean looked up at him a few times before he devoted himself to reading.

It was only five or six pages, but the text was dense and printed in an archaic-looking Gothic script. There were so many references beyond Young Dean’s familiarity, and by the end he felt like his vision was swimming. But reading it for himself was different than hearing about it second-hand, and he now had a few clearer images in his head of what to expect. He wasn’t done with research, but he slumped back against the seat to give his brain a brief break.

He looked at Castiel’s dark head studiously bowed over a different book written in symbols Young Dean didn’t recognise.

“This how you all spend a Friday night these days?” Young Dean asked.

“It’s Wednesday,” said Castiel. “You’re still on ‘98 time.”

“Oh,” said Young Dean. Yesterday had been Thursday but today was Wednesday. Because life made no fucking sense. “So, what do you do on Friday night?”

“This,” said Castiel.

Young Dean thought he caught it, just for a second, the glimmer of a smile. Just a twitch at the corner of Cas’ mouth, quickly trained away. God, the muted thrill of success, the magnetic draw of attraction, and the sense of utter endearment. No small wonder that Dean was addicted to this.

No small wonder he didn’t want to risk losing it.

“You gotta have some distractions,” said Young Dean. “Night on the town now and then. Come on, I don’t buy it. Look at you. Bet you left a string of broken hearts in Heaven.”

Cas lifted his head from his book to look across at Young Dean, though the heavy-lidded gaze remained placid. Not offended, not startled, just even-keeled as always. Young Dean wondered if Cas was seeing right through him. Right through the pompous front of locker-room jawing, a faithful old tactic of Dean’s that suddenly just didn’t _work_ with this guy.

Maybe Dean was right that Cas would’ve done something, given some indication, if he wanted Dean. He must know what Dean felt. He must know down to Dean’s very last molecule what he thought, what stirred in him. Because Young Dean felt right now that Cas had an even easier time reading him than he had with the ancient symbols in that book.

But Cas didn’t say, _I know what you’re really asking_ ; or, _Did Dean put you up to this?_ ; or, _Nice try, kid_. He answered with that same literal, upfront manner he responded to everything with. “It isn’t usual for angels to have affairs with one another. We’re all siblings, for one. We share a heavenly father.”

“Ah,” said Young Dean. “Awkward _and_ gross.”

“And it goes against our divine ordinance. Among angels, emotion is strongly discouraged.” He paused. “It is corrected, where it’s found. Feelings… feelings are gateways to doubt, and doubting the Divine Plan? Well, if an angel doubts his only purpose, why call him an angel at all?”

This. This must be what Dean had tried to say. That angels don’t feel at all, therefore a romance with Cas is an impossibility. The thought that Dean might have been right about something was endlessly frustrating to Young Dean.

“So… So angels can’t fall in love?” he asked. He had to be sure.

“Oh, they can,” said Cas, his expression utterly open. He didn’t seem to find this too personal, which kept shocking Young Dean. Normally Dean would slide his way out of uncomfortable conversations about feelings and relationships and all that gooey crap. But right now, feeling on the one hand like an outsider with no skin in the game, and on the other a very self-interested party in the revelations here, he was surprised at how easy it was. And how comforting. He could listen to Cas talk for ages.

“After all, that’s how Nephilim come into being,” Cas continued. “Nephilim are the children of angels and humans. Like Jack.”

“Jack?” said Young Dean. “So he’s yours and… Who’s his mom?”

“His mother was a woman named Kelly Kline. She was a wonderful person. Though Jack is, once more, an exception to the rule in many ways. His father, Lucifer, never loved Kelly. I doubt he loved anybody.”

“Oh. Jack’s father is Lucifer,” said Young Dean. “That’s normal.”

“Not really,” said Cas, and the frankness made Young Dean smile.

“I’ve kind of got the impression there’s not a lot that’s normal around here,” said Young Dean. “Sorry for asking all these questions. The whole angel thing is new to me.”

“Yes, I can understand that,” said Cas. “I can’t stop noticing how refreshing it is to talk with a Dean who hasn’t watched _Dogma_ yet.”

“What’s _Dogma_?”

“It’s a movie that will come out next year, for you. It informs at least 70 per cent of what you believe about angels, going forward. Regrettably.”

“Huh,” said Young Dean. His thumb played with the corner of the book in his lap, passing over the paper-edge with a gentle _shnick_. “So is that how you fell? Because you—”

“Because I felt too much, yes,” said Castiel. He looked back down at his book. “For humanity.”

It was the first time Young Dean felt the angel being less than direct with him. He’d interrupted too soon, at too critical a moment. Falling into step like he’d done this dance before.

So they were both hopeless, the pair of them. Good to know.

Young Dean unfolded from his chair, bringing his book back to Castiel. “Got a second-best griffin-book for me?” he asked.

Cas looked at the tomes around him, quickly evaluating before selecting one that was open to the correct page, another that was closed with a bookmark in it. “Try these two,” he said.

Young Dean picked up the latter, turning it in his hands to read the weathered spine. _Expositio in monstrum portentum_. He sighed deeply. “I’m starting to appreciate that having a whole-ass library doesn’t actually make things easier.”

“About time.” This was Dean’s voice, appearing from a doorway in the corner with Sam in tow. Sam had that red-eyed, untethered look that Young Dean knew meant barely resisting tears. Sammy could be a little more emotional than Dean ever allowed for himself, outwardly at least, but it still tugged at his heart. He wanted to fix it. He supposed that’s what his modern-day version had already attempted.

Young Dean did the polite thing and looked away from Sam so that he could have his emotions in manly privacy.

“You should finish up here,” said Dean. “We’re making an early start tomorrow. The lead we have on a griffin is up past the Wind River Range in Wyoming. We’ll drive, break at a motel, and go from there. How you feeling, Cas?”

“I’ll get there,” said Cas.

“Well don’t go thinking you need to be a hero,” said Dean. “If you need to rest, you rest.”

Young Dean returned to his chair as Dean gave his orders, opening up the book and tilting it to better catch the light of a lamp.

“I need to put a curfew on you, Teen-Dean?” Dean asked, sounding almost like his father.

“I’m going to catch up on some research,” said Young Dean. An unequivocal statement. He waited for Dean to counter it, to say he’d been given an order, boy. To say he knew better.

Dean hesitated, the words nearly on his lips. His eyes dropped to the book in Young Dean’s lap, rose again to the expectant expression on his face. “That’s good,” he said. “That’s a good idea. Just turn off the lights when you’re done, will you?”

“Yeah, whatever,” said Young Dean, shrugging one shoulder.

Dean nodded once more. Looked like he’d speak, but simply left. Cas pretended to read for, at most, one more sentence, then closed his book with an air of finality and followed.

“If you’re looking for griffin info,” said Sam (making that clearing-throat-cough that said he was getting his emotions under control), “you can also see what I’ve pulled up here.” He maneuvered his open laptop so that Young Dean could easily see and read the open page on the screen. “Just press this down arrow button to read more.”

“Thanks, Sammy.”

“Anytime. G’night.”

Sam passed through the kitchen on his path to the hallway, walking by a conspicuously silent Cas and Dean huddled near one corner, bidding them a muted goodnight in turn.

Dean stood with arms folded, leaning against the counter, waiting for Sam’s door down the hall to close. He looked back at Cas. “I don’t even know what being nice is,” he said. “Was that alright? Am I supposed to go, I dunno, offer him a beer or something? Is that inappropriate?”

“It was better,” Cas assured.

“You’ve always had more of a knack for this kid stuff,” said Dean, shaking his head. “Like with Jack. You always know the right things to say.”

“This is a somewhat more unusual circumstance,” said Cas, eyes narrowing, but a smile playing at his mouth.

“Right,” said Dean. “He’s me.”

“And he’s not a kid.”

“He’s a fucking babe in the woods, just look at him,” said Dean. “He’s so eager and unguarded. He’s gonna get himself hurt somehow.”

“Only you would look at him and call him unguarded,” said Cas. “Weren’t you the one telling us all ‘he’s seen worse’ and ‘he can handle it?’”

Dean’s fist clenched against his side, jaw going tight, then relaxing.

“But then again, you’re not talking about fighting and hunting,” said Cas.

“Sure I am. He gets killed out there, that’s gonna have a pretty significant consequence for me.”

“You know you survive,” said Cas. “Sam’s new shoes, the sixty-eight dollars, only proves that. You don’t want him to be vulnerable to… everything else about the world. That’s a very parental instinct, Dean.”

“Maybe it’s just self-serving,” said Dean.

“You shouldn’t sell yourself short.”

“And maybe it’s not him,” said Dean, pinching at the bridge of his nose, head bowed. “I’m the one who can see it all coming and can’t do anything to change it for him. I’m the one who’s helpless.”

Cas put a hand on Dean’s shoulder. As always, the shape of his grip echoed down from skin to soul. “Dean,” he said.

Whatever followed never came. A sound from the doorway interrupted. Young Dean, briefly frozen.

“Oh,” he said. “I was just gonna— I’ll go.”

“What is it, kid?” Dean asked. Cas’ touch fell away from him. Their posture opened out, disentangling from the intimate confidences of mere seconds before.

“I was just gonna get some— water. Or. A beer or something. Maybe.”

Dean shoved away from the counter, opened the fridge, and pulled out a bottle of beer for Young Dean. He crossed to the doorway, offering it out. “Here you go, kid.”

“Gee, thanks Pops,” said Young Dean, the sarcastic response arriving on auto-pilot. He had the grace to look a shade contrite, after. “I mean. Thanks. I’ll let you… get back to it.” He raised the unopened bottle in a feeble salute.

Dean didn’t ‘get back to it.’ He lingered at the doorway for a moment, not looking back at Cas, then said, “And to think, all our success hinges on that guy.”

“I have faith in him,” said Cas. Dean spared a glimpse over his shoulder, confirming with a glance that Cas meant it. “Goodnight, Dean.” Cas turned away for his own room. Hopefully, thought Dean, to sleep away the tired greyness barely concealed beneath his eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> » the Young Dean & Cas conversation almost turned itself word-for-word into that moment from _The Get Down_ : "you ever been in love?" - "once." - "how did it end?" - "it hasn't."  
> » _has_ someone made a deancas edit of that and, if not, WILL THEY????  
> » also I'm not really in the fandom per se so like, is talking about the influence of _Dogma_ on everything post-S4 a thing? cause it should be  
> » ch. 4 title reference: "Play with Fire" by The Rolling Stones (the song so nice they used it twice, thanks for that spn)


	5. go down and invade the street

They left early, long before the first light of a cold February morning. Young Dean fell asleep in the back seat shortly after dawn, tuckered out from the late night of reading up on griffins. He slept with his head tipped back, arms tucked hard around himself.

“Got enough heat back there?” Dean asked Cas, uselessly adjusting the vents. An old car like Baby, beautiful as she was, didn’t always handle temperature evenly. With Cas it wasn’t much of an issue—he seemed to be whatever temperature he wanted to be—but it was a different story with Young Dean.

“Here,” said Cas, shifting in the cramped space behind Sam. “He can have my coat.”

“You don’t have to,” said Dean, wanting him to stop, but having no good reason to provide as to why. He was the one who started this. “Cas, buddy, he’s fine.”

But already Cas draped Young Dean in his coat. Meanwhile Sam rubbed at his temple and watched the road with far too intense a focus.

Young Dean relaxed under the warm layer of the coat. The next time Dean dared to look in the rear-view mirror, it was to see Young Dean slumped with his cheek against Cas’ shoulder.

Dean thought, _That’s how I would look_.

Stopped that thought before it went further. He eased the Impala away from the rumble strip on the side of the highway, back to the middle of his lane.

Young Dean woke up when they stopped for lunch and gas. Dean saw about filling up the tank, but when Young Dean made to go inside Sam stopped him. “Maybe you two better stay by the car,” he said, looking between the Deans. “You might draw the wrong kind of attention. You’ve got this sort of Uncanny Valley thing going on.”

“People never heard of twins before?” asked Dean, unfastening the gas cap.

“You’re different ages,” said Sam.

“Maybe he’s my dad,” said Young Dean. “Like father, like son.”

“More _Twilight Zone_ than _Modern Family_ , trust me on this,” said Sam. “Look, stay in the car and I won’t give you grief about getting you the bacon cheeseburgers, okay?”

“Then I want a coffee,” said Young Dean, rubbing at one eye and slouching down in the seat once more.

“Right. Dean? Coffee?”

“Nah, I’m fine,” said Dean, though it was hard to discern whether he didn’t want it or simply refused to copy Young Dean’s order as a point of pride.

Which only lasted until they both said in unison, “Hey, don’t forget the pie.”

In Caspar, Wyoming, they had to switch out of Baby and move into something that could handle the mountain terrain a little better. Dean justified it to himself under the premise that Baby wasn’t _incapable_ , he just didn’t want to put her in any danger. The salt on winter roads was bad enough, let alone what a rough mountain pass could do to her.

They moved their gear from Baby’s trunk into a year-old Ford Expedition from a rental place. Leather seats that smelled new and had likely never hauled an enemy demon or a corpse of any kind. Dean’s mouth twisted in disgust at the screen that lit up in the centre of the console with a Winter Weather Driving Tip, meanwhile Young Dean leaned forward to look at it with wonder.

“The rental lady mentioned a motel off 26, close to where we’re heading, with good rates,” said Dean. “Be there in a couple hours.”

“I guess we don’t strike it rich in the future,” Young Dean said. “I mean, I’d figured that much, but I kind of hoped for an end to the cheap motels.”

“Don’t worry about the money thing,” said Dean. “A friend of ours set us up with some credit cards. It doesn’t cost anything.”

“Then why not stay somewhere nice?” Young Dean asked.

“Because big spending might draw big attention,” said Dean. “And small joints keep their mouths shut when you come back at four a.m. covered in something else’s blood. Didn’t you learn anything from Dad?”

“Dad wasn’t exactly a genius with financial planning,” said Young Dean. "If you recall."

Dean’s hands tightened on the wheel. (A heated steering wheel. Of all the ridiculous luxuries).

“We just need somewhere to lay our heads, and a cheap motel is as good a home base as any,” said Dean.

“This from the guy who ordered every single item off the Room Service menu when the British Men of Letters brought us to a real hotel,” said Sam, looking over his shoulder to Young Dean and Cas.

“And staying in a hotel now would just remind me of those pompous bastards,” said Dean. “Wouldn’t say no to a chocolate on the pillow again, though.”

It took a few more hours driving to reach their destination, a shabby mountain town with few attractions or tourists. Young Dean, hoping for more glimpses of modernity, thought this town probably looked the same in 1960 as it did in 2020. The sign for the Golden Eagle Motel even proudly boasted rooms with colour TV. 

Sam made them stay in the car again when checking into the motel. He came back with two room keys, side-by-side, and no-nonsense room assignments too. He didn’t trust Dean and Young Dean not to murder one another in the night, so Young Dean would stay with Sam and Dean with Cas.

“Cas and I will go scrounge up some supper,” said Sam, taking the keys to the Expedition. “The clerk mentioned a decent family restaurant. Should be back in half an hour. Don’t kill your double.”

He left them in Dean’s room with the laptop and gear. Dean started sorting weapons while Young Dean flipped through channels on the TV. But there wasn’t much to the task. The guns were in good order, the knives were sharp, nothing loose or missing.

“I’m bored,” said Young Dean, still flipping up through channels. None of these were shows he had any context for, and the commercials were too loud and flashy.

“Bored as hell,” Dean agreed, standing up. “Get your coat on. We’re going out.”

“Yes!” said Young Dean, switching off the TV at once. “Figures you’re the only fun one.”

“I don’t give a damn about Sam’s spooky doppelganger line,” said Dean, pocketing his room key and patting his pocket for his wallet. “Anyone asks, you’re my kid. Regular chip off the old block.”

“What does he think they’re gonna do, here, anyway?” asked Young Dean, following Dean out into the crisp, February night. “Accuse us of witchcraft and burn us at the stake?”

“Exactly,” said Dean, thrusting his hands into the pockets of his jacket to keep them warm. He walked briskly down the quiet street, with Young Dean matching the pace naturally. “You know how Sam is.”

“Overthinks things,” said Young Dean.

“Overthinks things, yeah,” said Dean.

Young Dean looked across at Dean, wrinkling up his nose. “Are we bonding?”

“Hell no,” said Dean. “But you can’t be wrong about everything. I mean, you’re me.”

“What a ringing endorsement,” said Young Dean. “Should we try this place?” He gestured, his hand in his coat pocket, at an everyday pub & grill on the opposite side of the street. This tiny town probably didn’t have more than two or three booze joints, and this one had the benefit of being nearest.

“Good as anywhere,” said Dean.

It was a Thursday night and the place was fairly quiet, with only a few customers settled in at different tables. Dean and Young Dean approached the bar. The owner, a tall and broad man who had no hair on his head but quite an impressive moustache, straightened up from where he’d been leaning against the bar top, watching the game on TV.

Dean bantered for a moment, asked who was winning, learned the bartender was named Roger and it had been a slow night, slow time of year. Dean was such an old hand at probing for intel and passing it off as idle jabber that he barely registered himself doing it. If Roger had nothing more interesting than sports and the weather to report, it was probably a good sign. Besides that, it gave him a moment to scan the beer fridge behind Roger. He ordered a Miller because it didn’t look like they had much else.

“Same for me,” said Young Dean, speaking up at last.

“I’m gonna need to see some ID first,” said Roger.

“No problem,” said Young Dean, taking out his wallet, fishing out a Texas driver’s license.

Dean watched it happen with a strange feeling of inertia, knowing he was witness to a spectacular failure even before it played out. He could do nothing to stop it. He didn’t know why he hadn’t thought of it earlier.

Young Dean passed his ID to Roger, and Roger held it in an outstretched arm to read the tiny lettering from a better distance.

He looked up at Young Dean seriously.

“This is you?”

“Mmhm,” said Young Dean, refusing to show doubt or hesitation.

“You’re 43?”

Young Dean kept that mild smile fixed in place, although his face was perhaps a little too frozen. “I look really good for my age.”

“That’s mine,” said Dean, reaching for the licence. “That’s me.”

“This licence expired in 2001,” said Roger, turning his discontented face towards Dean now.

“Where’d you find this old thing anyway?” Dean asked Young Dean, taking the ID from Roger and flashing a look at the outdated card, forcing a jocular tone. “Kids, am I right?” he said, trying to get Roger back on his side.

“You can show yourself out,” said Roger. He didn’t crack a smile. Even his moustache looked distinctly unfriendly.

“He was kidding around,” said Dean. “I never thought he’d be so brazen, ordering a grown-up drink like that. He’ll have a Shirley Temple. Come on, Roger.”

“Out,” said Roger. “I don’t need these antics in my bar. Out, or I’ll throw you out.”

“Right,” said Dean. Roger probably meant it. He didn’t look like a man who gave second chances. Dean clapped a hand on Young Dean’s shoulder to guide him along. “C’mon, kiddo.”

Young Dean walked stiffly, staring straight ahead, reliving the last few minutes vividly.

He expected Dean to ream him out and call him an idiot again. Instead, the moment they were out in the crisp, cool air again, Dean cackled. Head tipped back, arm over his stomach, genuinely laughing.

“Your _face_ back there!”

“Oh shut up,” said Young Dean. “It’s your face too.”

Dean still laughed, barely looking at where they were going as Young Dean pressed onward down the street. “‘ _I look really good for my age_.’” Dean mimicked. “Jeez, Teen-Dean. Really thought you’d just show off a licence from ‘98?”

“It worked two days ago,” said Young Dean. “You’d have done the same thing.”

“I wouldn’t,” said Dean. Though that gave him pause. “Or would I? Fuck, I guess I would.”

“You would. And you did,” said Young Dean.

“Alright, alright,” said Dean. “I’ll give you that one. Let’s try this place up here. And don’t burn this one on us because a town like this probably won’t have any other options.”

They crossed the street again, angling down towards a spot that fashioned itself like a saloon-meets-sports bar. This time Dean sent Young Dean off towards the dartboard. He’d be in charge of getting the drinks and smuggling them over before anyone thought to ask whether Young Dean should even be there.

Young Dean had the red darts in hand already when Dean returned with their beers. The colour Dean would’ve gravitated to first as well, apparently a long-standing partiality. He took blue instead.

“She look familiar to you?” Young Dean asked, gesturing up at a meticulously painted stretch of art on one of the walls. It was a larger-than-life image of a heavily made-up woman drinking suggestively from a bottle of beer. The artist clearly paid significant attention to rendering her generous cleavage and puffed-up lips in painstaking detail.

“Oh no way,” said Dean. “It’s Misty-Lee Vixxen.”

“That’s what I thought!” said Young Dean. “This is my new favourite place. Do we still have _Lay of the Land_?”

“Oh man,” said Dean. “Just you wait. There’s a sequel that comes out, _Lay Down the Law_ , where Misty’s this judge, right…”

Things deteriorated from there. As it turned out, both Deans were enablers. The next beers came with doubles of whiskey, and more followed that. Dean discovered that playing darts with himself was kind of awesome. If Sam made a poor throw Dean would’ve ribbed him about it endlessly, but when it was Young Dean missing a mark he’d called saying, “Oh no, I coulda made that,” Dean would say, “I know! I know! Here, I’ll get it.” And Young Dean cheered when he made it like the success was his own.

An hour later found them sitting at the table directly under Misty-Lee, empty beer bottles between them and fresh ones in their hands. They’d barely stopped laughing, the past few minutes.

“No,” said Young Dean. “No. You made him a _mixtape_?”

“A mixtape,” said Dean.

“What was on it? Anything I’d know?”

“It was…” He had to stop to laugh, because he knew Young Dean would find it funny. Or, unbearable. Same thing. “It was all Led Zeppelin. My top thirteen tracks.”

“Dean,” said Young Dean. “No. Not like… Not like Dad and Mom. You’re lying.”

“Not lying.”

“But you didn’t… We don’t still do the thing where you turn the last letters of ‘tracks’ into two little ‘x’s, right? Tell me you didn’t do that.”

Dean nodded his head heavily, barely suppressing a grin that was guilty and pleased at once. “I did. I did.” Not nearly guilty enough. Young Dean cracked up again.

“What the hell am I supposed to do about you?” Young Dean asked. “We used to have game, brother.”

“It’s just different when it counts, you know?” said Dean.

“I wouldn’t know,” said Young Dean.

“Eh, I guess not,” Dean conceded. They both lifted their beers, taking a swig with the same, easy action.

Dean, facing towards the entrance, caught sight of Sam first when the door opened, Cas just a step behind him. Sam spotted the two Deans, and any concern edged out of his face to be replaced by mild annoyance.

“Sammy!” Young Dean called out, spreading his arms wide. “Hey, Dean,” he said, eyes lighting up. “I never been to a bar with Sammy before.”

“The novelty wears off,” Dean answered, just as Sam and Cas reached their table. He turned in his seat, taking on a lax, heavy angle as he leaned an elbow against the tabletop. “Fellas,” he said by way of greeting.

“What part of ‘Stay in the motel’ was the confusing bit?” Sam asked.

“Motel was boring,” said Dean.

“Yeah,” said Young Dean. “Motel was boring.”

“At least you aren’t hard men to find,” said Sam, “with only two bars in town.”

“The other one tipped us off about the forty-three-year-old teenager with an expired licence,” said Cas, looking at Young Dean. Young Dean shrugged his shoulders and smiled in a way he thought was too adorable to resist. Dean remembered using that shrug as recently as last year.

“What took you so long to get here, then?” asked Dean, drinking back the last of his beer.

“Getting the egg may turn out to be easier than getting food in this town after eight o’clock,” huffed Sam. “The family joint kept us waiting almost forty minutes, till they admitted their short-order cook walked out on them right before we got there, so then we drove over to the pizza place, which had closed down early, and then, when we finally found somewhere—”

“Guess this is a bad time to tell him we already got chili fries,” said Young Dean, looking over at Dean.

Dean found this hilarious, bursting with laughter, even as Sam looked as if he might be visiting a new, highly personalized Hell.

“You done?” he asked as Dean wiped at the corner of one eye. “Alright. We’re done. C’mon, let’s get outta here.” The Deans stumbled up from their seats, leaving behind their table. Young Dean spun on his heel to bid goodbye to the extravagantly overworked Misty-Lee. Dean caught him as he swaggered forward again, patting him on the back on the way out the door.

Dean didn’t find the cold as cutting as he had on the way down. By default, he took the lead back towards the motel, matching strides with Sam.

Lagging behind with Cas, a little drunker despite having matched Dean drink-for-drink, Young Dean tilted his head back to look at the array of stars in the dark mountain sky. His breath misted out above him. Heat came off him in waves as the night air cooled away the scent of bar and beer.

“You had a good night, I take it?” Cas asked. Unlike Sam, he didn’t seem irritated by the situation. It wasn’t apathy, thought Young Dean, that wouldn’t be the way to describe it. It was total freedom from judgement. Something he’d never experienced before. It was such an unusual concept that it was almost hard to fathom. If he weren’t drunk, his brain might not have even considered it a possibility.

“Great night,” said Young Dean, heaving a sigh. “I haven’t laughed like that in a while.”

“I’m glad you two are getting along,” said Cas. That trace of a smile appeared at the corner of his mouth. “You have a lot in common.”

Young Dean wanted to touch it, that secret laugh. That mouth in general. He wouldn’t normally have thought it. He would have stopped himself before allowing his brain to consider that he found a man genuinely attractive. Maybe it was the alcohol, or maybe it was knowing what future feelings were, but Young Dean didn’t make himself stop thinking it this time.

“Do we have much in common?” Young Dean asked. “You and me?”

Cas tipped his head as he considered the answer. “I don’t know if that’s how I’d put it,” he said. He was answering Young Dean, but looking at the Dean ahead of them. “We’re from very different worlds. But I think we look forward in the same direction.”

Something sprouted in Young Dean’s chest very suddenly that felt delicate and new. He looked down at his feet. Swallowed hard. “That’s good,” he said. “I’m glad he has that.” He sniffed against the cold air. “You know, sometimes I think even me and Sammy are at odds. In my time, I mean. We fight like all brothers, get over it like all brothers, too, but I can sometimes see him changing. His fights with Dad keep getting worse. And, you know, this one time he ran away entirely. On my watch. Ran away to Flagstaff, of all places, and I know he was mad at Dad, but how could he… I mean, did he want to get away from me, too? And then I see the way he turned out—it’s great we’re together now—but if he went off to Stanford, I mean if he left the life while Dad was still around?” Young Dean shook his head, letting out another long breath. “I’m thinking of the little brother I know right now, and I hate that he’s going to leave me, you know?”

Young Dean looked up, blinking quickly because he wasn’t a crier, and saw that look in Cas’ eyes again that wasn’t pity. The look was too generous for that.

“You mean the world to him,” said Cas. “No matter where he goes, or for what reason. You’re afraid of people leaving you?”

Young Dean sniffed again, gave a non-committal jerk of his head, a shrug. A yes, then.

Cas nodded once, as if he suspected as much. “It’s strange,” he said. “I would say that you, more than most, draw people to you. I don’t believe you can be as easily forgotten or easily left as you think. I’ve never wanted to leave.” His lips pressed together, going over his own words. “Though I have left, despite that. Maybe it’s all the same, to you.”

“I don’t hold it against you, Cas,” Young Dean said quickly.

Cas almost laughed. “That’s very magnanimous of you,” he said. “Although you might want to check that he feels the same.” He nodded his head towards Dean.

“I don’t have to,” said Young Dean earnestly. “Obviously you came back. That’s enough.”

“And Sam came back,” said Cas, nimbly circling back to that point. “Even if it wasn’t easy to have him gone.”

Young Dean nodded, feeling better. He cleared his throat once, straightened his shoulders, shedding off the maudlin aspect and putting on something stoic and nonchalant again. “So you do this all the time?” he asked. “Talking about all this emotional crap? Casually asking people, ‘Is your worst fear being left behind?’ You must be great at parties.”

“I am not very good at parties,” said Cas. “I haven’t been to many.”

“That’s something I want to see, now,” said Young Dean, mood elevating a little more each moment. He even laughed as Cas pulled at the sleeve of his jacket to keep him from tripping off the curb in front of the motel.

“You chuckleheads alright back there?” Dean called back.

Young Dean saluted. “Sir, yessir,” he said. Cas and Young Dean came to a stop where the other two stood, in between the two motel rooms.

“Teen-Dean’s functionally useless to us right now,” Sam said to Dean, rubbing at his forehead, fit to make his hairline recede if he kept at it. “And you’re not much better. So, I guess Cas and I will go scout out the mountain so we can be ready tomorrow. When our only hope at wasting this thing isn’t plastered.”

Young Dean leaned against the brick wall of the motel, grinning and slurring, “Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi.”

“Scouting trip only,” Dean said, sober enough to look at Sam with focus as he gave his orders. His gaze drifted to Cas. “No splitting up. You two look out for each other out there.”

“We know, Dean,” said Sam. “Now both of you, sleep it off. Dean, keep a radio on. We might not have cell coverage up there, but I’ll broadcast out if things go sideways.”

Dean granted a nod. Both Deans lingered outside while Cas and Sam got back into the Expedition, seeing them off until the rear lights disappeared.

They each entered their neighbouring motel rooms. They each took the bed closest to the door, in order to be the one in the way of whatever danger might come through.

* * *

Dean woke up when Cas made it back around three a.m. He pushed himself up on an arm and rubbed tiredly at one eye. “How’d it go up there?” he asked.

“A lot of dead ends at first,” said Cas. “But we think we’ve found its cave.”

“That’s good work,” said Dean, voice hushed out of respect for the dark of night, even though they were the only two in the room. “So we can go straight there tomorrow with Teen-Dean.”

“There’s some bad news,” said Cas, sitting down on the bed opposite Dean. Dean moved to sit upright, tired but attentive, bringing his feet down to the cold motel room carpet.

“Hit me with it,” he said.

“We aren’t the only ones looking for the griffin.”

“Shit,” said Dean.

“Sam and I found footprints. Three people, at least.”

“No chance they’re just some stray hikers?” said Dean.

“Most hikers don’t leave behind traces of sulfur.”

“Damn. What would demons want with a griffin egg?”

“They might want the same thing we do,” said Cas. “The timing is too convenient. The Arimaspoi want a griffin egg, but I doubt they care who they get it from.”

“If demons are after the egg…”

“Then we have to believe that they must be after the sword as well. And they might not be the only ones who know it exists.”

Dean palmed a hand over his face, rubbing away vestiges of drowsiness. “Why can’t a fight ever stay small?” he asked. “Seems like the minute we learn about some crazy, new, powerful thing, everyone and their grandma is after it too. I just wish I knew what was going through Eileen’s head when she left. She’s careful, and smart. It’s not like her to be reckless.”

“You think you and Sam have the monopoly on doing the big, dumb, brave thing?”

“Ouch. That's some tough love, Cas.”

“She is smart. So whatever the circumstances, they must have been very persuasive.”

“You’ve done the big, dumb, brave thing a couple of times yourself, you know, Cas,” said Dean.

“Don’t lump me in with you two,” said Cas, barely resisting the gleam of a smile. “I was trying to say that if she’s taking these risks, it’s not because she didn’t think it through. Someone must have threatened her in a way that counted. Like harm to someone she loves. Or the extermination of all humanity.”

“Weird how those things are on equal footing.”

“Well,” said Cas, looking away and lifting one shoulder in a neutral shrug. “Maybe they are. I’ve spent too long around you to know if there should be a difference.”

“I guess Big Dumb Brave Disease is contagious,” said Dean. He covered a yawn.

“And incurable,” said Cas. “Go back to sleep, Dean. It’s late.”

“Yeah. Yeah, alright.” Dean started to get back under the motel blankets. His spot was cold. He swore wind swept in under the door and cut through every window in this place. “You still need shut-eye from that time travel?”

“I’m better now,” said Cas. He wouldn’t need to sleep. “I’ll stay here, though. I won’t— I won’t leave.”

“Suit yourself,” Dean said, settling in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> » I was never gonna write straight whump, so here's Dean having a great time because I love Dean's joy  
> » that the two Deans getting along also happens to be Sam's nightmare is for all of us as a little treat  
> » ch. 5 title reference: "Rio" by Low Cut Connie (this song is more fun and more homosexy than Dean would ever allow for himself but come on: _bribe the bouncer to let me in / bribe my brother just to be my twin_ )


	6. when the curtain calls for you

In the morning they sent Young Dean out for breakfast with a credit card and a casual manner like they weren’t merely getting rid of him. Sam had also given him a breakfast order that was clearly made up, either in order to keep Young Dean away longer, or to make sure the waitress laughed in his face at it. No one ate this kind of shit.

When he got to the restaurant he made up his own order for Sam. Nothing gross, even if Sam deserved it. Young Dean was a good big brother and just knew better than Sam what he should have.

He settled in at one of the seats along the counter to wait for the food, most of his attention absorbed by a display case full of pie. He wondered how much he could get away with ordering. Cas, Sam, and Dean weren’t going to let him overstay his welcome here. Once they had the griffin egg, they’d send Young Dean back to his own time, where a square meal didn’t come so easy. He drummed his fingers against the counter as he thought over the relative risks and benefits of eating his weight in pie immediately before fighting a deadly mythical creature.

Outside the large front windows he heard a car door slam. He looked over with tacit curiosity, always attentive to the little ebbs and flows of his surroundings, even when they were for the most part benign. You had to be prepared for the moment they suddenly weren’t.

Muffled raised voices volleyed back and forth. A teenage girl with curly dark hair tied in a loose ponytail shouted at a man who was clearly her father. Spitting venom, cussing him out by the looks of it. Her dad slammed his hand on the top of the car, pointed at her and barked an order, then marched off in another direction.

The girl entered the restaurant in high dudgeon, but notably had the courtesy not to take it out on Bonnie, the efficient waitress on the other side of the counter.

Young Dean leaned in to speak to the girl. “Nothin’ beats family, am I right?”

She cast a quick look at him, blushed, then bounced a couple of times on the balls of her feet. “Guess everybody saw that, huh?” she said. All of a sudden shy, like she hadn’t made a surprisingly crude gesture at her dad’s back just moments before.

“Don’t worry about it,” said Young Dean. “I have a hell of a time dealing with my old man, some days.”

“Believe me, he’s got nothing on my dad,” she said.

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that.” Young Dean picked up a sugar shaker. The waitress’ back was turned and he sprinkled a bit out on the counter, idly drawing his finger through the grains. He wasn’t good at staying still. “What can you do, though? It’s family.”

“I can’t wait to move out,” she said. “I’d leave now if I could. I don’t need him. It’s been a long time since he was much of a father.”

“That so? How old are you anyway?”

“I’m fifteen.”

“Aw, I got a little brother that’s fifteen,” said Young Dean. “Wish he was here. He’s a great kid.” But talking about younger Sammy, the one Young Dean really knew, made him feel too strange and wistful, so he forced himself to push away from that line of thought. Focus back on this poor girl having a shitty day and try to make it a little better. “What’s your name?”

“Rachel,” she said.

“Rachel, I’m Dean,” he said. “Look, you got a long way to go before you might be able to strike out on your own. I don’t know how to make an Asshole Dad any _less_ of an Asshole Dad or I’d have done it by now, believe you me. But what I _do_ know is that this place has pie. And pie might not make a shitty situation any better, but it can’t make things any worse, either. And at least you'll have pie.” He beckoned Bonnie back over with a wave, patently ignoring the brief scowl the waitress directed at his spilled sugar.

“A slice of pie for my friend, here,” he said. “What’s your favourite, Rach?”

“Oh. I don’t know,” said Rachel, her hungry eyes taking in the whole case.

“Our peanut butter pie’s the very best,” said Bonnie.

“Yeah, that,” said Rachel. “Thanks.” She looked at Young Dean again. “Thanks. You didn’t have to.”

“It’s the least I could do, Rachel.” He leaned in a little. “Honestly, it’s my dad’s credit card, and he’s—”

He cut off, spotting Castiel caught in the morning sun just outside the door. He entered the restaurant with the jangle of the bell.

“Damn,” said Young Dean.

“Is that your dad?” Rachel asked, a touch breathless.

“No that’s not— He’s my dad’s—” It still felt weird to refer to his older self as his father, but it was the only thing that made sense to an outsider. “He’s my dad’s friend.”

“ _Oh_ ,” said Rachel.

“Not like that,” said Young Dean.

“Not like what?” This was Cas, who’d made it to Young Dean’s side.

“Hey, Cas,” said Young Dean. “This is Rachel.”

“Hi. Sir,” said Rachel.

“This is nice,” said Cas. “Look at you. Making friends.” He reached up and lightly pinched Young Dean’s cheek. It was a great time for the angel to decide to start being funny. It was all Dean’s influence, too. Probably Dean sent him over here just to harass him. Cas kept a scrupulously straight face, but Young Dean swore he caught the glint of humour in his eyes.

Bonnie returned to slide a plate of pie across to Rachel, and a tray of coffees to Young Dean, which Cas picked up on his behalf.

“I guess that’s mine,” Young Dean said to Rachel, collecting his bag with the takeaway containers from Bonnie. “Good to meet you, Rachel. Hope you and your dad work things out.”

“Not likely,” said Rachel. “But hey.” She circled her fork above her plate. “At least I have pie.”

Young Dean flashed a wide grin. “Atta girl,” he said.

They left the restaurant behind, but Young Dean noticed the thoughtful look Cas directed back toward it. He heaved a sigh. He felt like an idiot for being so corny and soft with the girl back there, but he knew where she was coming from. He knew how many times just one stranger being nice to him would’ve made all the difference. “Whatever it is you want to say,” he said. “Just go ahead and get it over with.”

“I don’t know if you’d care to hear it,” said Cas.

“Well, that’s up to me, isn’t it?” said Young Dean. He didn’t want Cas passing judgement on him, or, worse, mentioning this to Sam or Dean. Dean especially. He needed to keep this contained.

Cas’ eyes looked bluer in the winter sunlight of the mountains, even as they squinted against the brightness of the morning. “You keep saying that you’re not good with kids,” said Cas. His moderate tone gave way to significantly more annoyance. “And not only is it not true, it’s _never_ been true.”

Young Dean hadn’t expected that one. He walked for a moment in silence, wide-eyed, processing. “That didn’t exactly sound off the cuff, buddy,” he said. God, was this an argument they’d had before? It sounded like one. It sounded like Cas was making a case for adopting a third kid and like Dean kept shooting it down. “You want more kids?”

“Yes, but that’s not important right now,” said Cas. Continuing on like that wasn’t dumbfounding on its own. “The ‘I’m not good with kids’ line is part of the story you keep telling yourself to perpetuate your self-loathing. And, like the rest of it, is just not true.”

“Christ on a bike, how messed up am I in the future?”

“This is part of it,” said Cas, gesturing broadly with a hand as if he could point at everything Young Dean just said. “Zeroing in on anything bad you can find, whether it’s meant that way or not.”

“You calling me paranoid?” Young Dean asked. Cas looked ready to soundly disagree again, but then Young Dean flashed a smile. He could be self-aware enough to joke about it. And it made Cas smile too, looking away, the fight going out of him.

“I’ve said too much,” said Cas, although that almost-smile lingered. “It’s not that I forget which Dean you are. It’s that you keep creating these openings. And I keep falling into them.”

“So we don’t talk about this shit in the future?” Young Dean asked. It was almost surprising, if they didn’t. Young Dean just found Cas so easy to bare his soul to. He kept wanting to do it.

“We talk a lot. Not always directly,” answered Cas. It was a suitably obscure response. Young Dean thought he understood it at first and didn’t notice Cas gracefully direct the conversation away; only to realize when they reached the motel that he had no idea if that was a ‘yes’ or a ‘no.’

* * *

Before they set out for the night, Sam made Young Dean sit down and ‘open his gift.’ The machete was badly wrapped in what was actually a ratty old road map of Ohio.

“Wonder what it could be,” said Young Dean, rolling his eyes and shaking his head at the fact that the machete was discernible not only by shape, but was clearly visible between gaps in the tape and paper. The stupid thing was that this dumb gesture, the extra effort of making it look like some kind of birthday present when there was really no need, entertained Sam. It was a brief thing: a self-satisfied laugh, a tongue-in-cheek quip, a moment of respite before they had to return to unrelenting hardship. It was always this way in the life. You had to take the good where you could get it. If you caught a glimpse of sun in the midst of a storm, you didn’t take it for granted.

Knowing they might encounter demons on the mountain changed how they packed. Young Dean’s chief weapon had to be the gifted machete, which he kept strapped to him to have on hand. But they had other tools now, things Young Dean never dreamed of. Demon-trap bullets, angel blades, and this little pig-sticker of a knife that they said would end a demon for good.

Young Dean briefly wondered how many people he’d save in the years ahead if he could take just one of these things back with him. It didn’t feel fair that to pilfer a knife and spare a couple of innocent lives in his own time would unravel the universe.

Darkness fell as Sam drove them up the mountain, scaling gravel roads that turned into rough logging trails, until the trees and snow grew too dense and cut them off entirely. It was cold this high up and they had to dress for it. Hats and gloves, sturdy boots, warm and waterproof clothes.

Cas excepted, of course. Dean kept glancing over at him as Sam conducted one final survey of his backpack, replete with a first aid kit and radio. They would be too far from society, too far from their own damn set of wheels, to take any chances.

“Cas, I’m getting cold just looking at you,” said Dean. “Would you put on some gloves at least?”

“I don’t need gloves, Dean,” said Cas.

“Humour me.”

Young Dean didn’t think Cas would do it. Cas was a formidable angel of the Lord with unthinkable divine powers and superhuman strength. He’d existed for aeons, before humans were even thought of, let alone one particular human from a very brief blip on the celestial timeline.

Cas heaved a sigh and went to the vehicle. He neatly ripped the tags off a new pair of winter gloves that Dean had bought in town that day and put them on. He adjusted the lay of the leather at his wrists and said, with a fondly scathing tone, “Satisfied?”

“Better,” said Dean. He turned back to Sam, now shouldering the backpack. “Ready? Or are we gonna stand around here all night?”

“You ready?” Sam asked this of Young Dean.

The look on Sam’s face made Young Dean nostalgic and protective and partial all at once. Sam still looked ready for Young Dean to change his mind and turn the whole thing down. As if there were too many dangers, not worth the risk. Mixed in with it was this hopefulness, like something he didn’t dare to have but couldn’t quite resist. The belief that just maybe this would work. They’d get the egg, then the sword, then Eileen, and no one would get hurt. And there was something else, some kind of fear that Young Dean didn’t expect to see and couldn’t place.

He stepped forward because he had to be the good big brother now, clapping a hand on Sam’s arm. “Born ready, Sammy,” he said. “Let’s kick some griffin tailfeather.”

“Actually it’s the front half that has feathers,” Cas said helpfully. “The tail is like a lion’s. God was in a very experimental phase.”

Dean, off to the side, looked delighted, a wide smile chasing across his face. No one else appeared to notice the private, unbroadcasted reaction apart from Young Dean, who dreaded reaching the time of his life where he found Castiel’s bone-dry commentary the peak of comedy.

And yet. It was terribly endearing.

“Stay close,” said Sam. “And stay quiet. We don’t know who else might be out here.”

Sam led the way, followed in a single-file line by Dean, Young Dean, then Cas. He stopped once or twice to confirm his bearings, to consult with Cas on the path they took, then wound on up the mountain. The sky held only a few passing clouds: navy blue in the centre, sharply bordered in silver from the bright moon. The snow coating the mountain passes reflected back the moonlight and starlight, an illuminated carpet over the world.

The path sometimes narrowed, sometimes flattened. At times they were required to scale up a rocky patch, mindful of each step, unable to afford the dangers of a foot getting caught in a crevice, or snow giving way underneath.

They stepped onto more even ground and a wider stretch, enough that all four could have walked easily abreast. On one side the rock of the mountain rose, but on the other side it dropped off swiftly. Sam held up a hand, mutely commanding the group to stop. The silence around them was so total that Young Dean’s breath sounded blaringly loud to his own ears.

The cock of a rifle echoed across the snow and ice, magnified in the empty night air.

Ahead of them, a man stepped out from behind a bulwark of rock. Winter gear filled out his wiry figure, but Young Dean recognised him all the same. Rachel’s father.

Dean recognised him too. “Peter? Peter Sousa?”

“Heard the Winchesters were in town,” said Peter. “Heard about some funny stuff going on down in the local bars.” Peter’s eyes darted between Dean and Young Dean, trying to puzzle it out. He didn’t slacken his hold on the weapon, fully prepared to shoot.

A hunter, Young Dean thought. Everything about this man said he was a hunter.

“Yeah, well,” said Dean. “Then you should’ve known to stay out of it. We’ve got this handled, Pete.”

“I can’t let you do that,” said Peter. “You turn around now and go home and I won’t shoot you. I don’t want to shoot you boys, but I will if I have to.”

Young Dean noticed movement behind the rock. Pete had company. The demons that Sam and Dean were worried about, maybe. So he thought at first. But he recognised that curly hair.

“Rachel?” he called out. Peter pointed the gun at him directly for it, but he didn’t care. He put it together all at once. “She’s your firstborn,” he said. “You’re making her go after the griffin.”

“You don’t understand,” Peter snapped, hands shaking, then quickly steadying again around the gun. “You don’t understand. I’ve only got one chance.”

“She’s a _kid_ ,” said Young Dean.

“She’s a fighter,” said Peter. “I taught her everything I—”

“Fuck you,” said Young Dean. “She’s fifteen. She’s your kid and you’re sending her to the slaughter.”

Rachel came out from her place of safety, scuttering over the snow down to her father’s side. “No, Dean,” she said, though her shaking voice betrayed her. “I can do this. This one last thing.”

“No way,” said Young Dean, stepping forth. Sam’s outstretched arm attempted to stop him, but Young Dean pushed easily past it to get a few steps closer. The other three men stayed frozen behind him, unwilling to provoke Peter when he had his sights on Young Dean.

“I have to,” she said.

“You don’t owe this piece of shit anything,” Young Dean said. “Why would you do this for him? You wanted to get away.”

“It’ll make things better,” said Rachel, trying for a firm expression. Moonlight caught in her glassy eyes. “Dad’s gonna be different. Like when I was little. He’s gonna be free.”

“Pete.” This was Dean, voice low and dangerous. “What’d you do?”

“Like you can talk,” said Peter, breath misting evenly before him. “Like the Winchesters never made a demon deal.”

“They put you up to this?” said Sam. “Do this one thing, and walk free from your contract? They’re using you, Peter.”

“So what if they are?” Peter asked. “I get a second chance once this is gone. A chance to get it right this time. To do right by my family.”

“Like you’re doing right now?” asked Sam. “Risking your own daughter?”

“His ten years are almost up. He’s a desperate man,” said Dean.

“Pete, you gotta know how messed up this is,” said Sam.

“You think you’re afraid of Hell?” Dean asked with a bitter laugh. “Oh, Hell’s bad enough. I’ve been there. But that won’t have nothin’ on walking this earth after sentencing your own daughter to die.”

“I can do it,” Rachel insisted. “I’m a hunter. I can save us.” Even her father didn’t look at her, not daring to face the seed of doubt her very words contained.

“They’re never gonna let you be free,” Dean said, focusing still on Peter. “There’ll always be one more deal. One more job.”

Peter shook his head. “Ever consider not everyone’s as shit at making deals as you?”

“Yeah,” said Dean. “But if you were better at it, you wouldn’t be here.”

The words were working. Peter’s posture slackened. Minutely at first, then the barrel of the gun pointed towards the ground.

It was at that moment, when better judgment nearly won out, that the four demons materialized on the mountaintop. One grabbed Rachel, pulling her back from her father with a knife to her throat. Two others flanked the small clearing, weapons drawn, facing down the Winchesters and Castiel. The fourth demon, the evident leader, stood at Peter’s side.

“New terms,” she said, facing him, careless of any audience. “Kill the party crashers or we kill your girl.”

There wasn’t much doubt about which of these options he would choose.

They went from standing still to avoid provocation to a flurry of movement, not about to become sitting ducks. Weapons drawn and immediately on the offense.

Young Dean had seen only two demon possessions in his life, and never seriously gone toe-to-toe with them. They were strong and fast and unkillable with regular weapons. That didn’t stop him from moving into the fight. He didn’t know what he wanted to do: whether he wanted to get to Peter and take the gun from his hands, or whether he wanted to reach Rachel and get her out of that demon’s paws. But with the fight descending, he didn’t have the luxury of an option. There was only what was right in front of him.

In this case, a demon who fought like a wild thing, and, when he had the window for it, barely even felt the dig of his machete into her belly.

“It’s cute that you tried,” she sneered, looking down at the metal buried in her, mocking his shocked reaction.

He might’ve been playing up the wide-eyed surprise. The time she took to taunt him was enough for him to pull out his gun, force it beneath her chin, and fire off a demon-trap bullet. The demon’s lips parted in a gasp, her mind alert but her body paralyzed. Dean pulled his machete out of her stomach and let her fall to the frozen ground.

His eyes darted over the fray. Cas on his way to Rachel by the edge of the cliff, Dean grappling in the snow with Peter, and Sam up against the flat mountainside with two demons on him—

Young Dean raced forward, slipping in the snow as he tried to reach Sam, who couldn’t keep holding off both his attackers much longer.

“Hey! Teen-Dean!” Dean called this out, aware of the melee around him even as he was barely staving off Peter, who thrashed wildly underneath him. Young Dean turned, caught the demon-killing knife Dean tossed to him, and put it to quick use on one of the two demons cornering Sam.

For all his troubles, Dean got caught in the jaw with Peter’s right hook, then went right back to scrapping.

Sam rallied, knocking back the remaining demon with an elbow. He delivered another disorienting punch, then reached for the strange-looking angel blade he carried, despatching of the demon with one sharp stab to the heart.

At the edge of an outcropping soundly out of the fray, where the demon holding Rachel captive lingered, Young Dean watched Cas fight without weapons. A hand to the demon’s head, and they were destroyed in a brutal shattering of light.

Only the leader of the demons remained, and Peter and Dean wrestling on the ground. With a carelessly dismissive gesture the demon leader threw Dean far from Peter, crashing him into a snowbank next to Sam.

“Well I don’t need _you_ ,” she said to Peter, standing above him. Young Dean rushed to intervene, wanting to do _something_.

“Dad!” Rachel cried out, running forward.

Her voice rang out across the sky, echoing back.

It wasn’t the sound of her scream, but where she stepped. A fatal pressure carving cracks in the hard slab of snow.

The ground shifted. It fell away.

One moment Cas stood on the outcropping. The next, the outcropping was gone.

Snow replaced the scene where most of the fight played out, changing the landscape so drastically that neither Sam nor Dean would have known it for the same place.

And Sam and Dean were the only ones left.

“No,” said Dean, staggering towards the freshly churned snow in the aftermath. It had sounded like lying under a freight train. It sounded unsurvivable. “No. This isn’t happening. They aren’t gone.”

“Dean! Dean, stop.” Sam had to pull him back from the unsound terrain. “We won’t find them that way.”

“Then how do we find them, Sam?” Dean demanded. Shouting like he could call down another avalanche, offer himself up to it this time.

Sam surveyed the avalanche’s path with a pained expression, looking for any sign from the snow of what to do next. He had nothing. “Teen-Dean has to be okay,” he concluded at last. “I mean, you’re still here, right? If anything happened to you that changed the timeline, we’d see that. So Teen-Dean’s still out there.”

“And Cas?” asked Dean.

“Hell, maybe Cas saved his skin,” said Sam. “Maybe they’re back in ‘98, or back at the motel or bunker.”

“But we don’t know that,” said Dean. “They could be buried under fifteen feet of snow.”

Sam looked out one more time. He didn’t say aloud that if that was the case, Dean and Sam would never find them. “The only thing we can do is go back to the car,” Sam said. “That was the plan. We’ll go quiet, we’ll keep a lookout and listen, but that’s where we’d meet if anything went wrong.”

They picked their way down their stretch of mountain, stopping frequently to listen, hoping to hear a voice call out or an emergency whistle. Nothing broke the silence but their own footsteps crunching through the snow.

“We accused Peter of offering up his own daughter for sacrifice,” Dean said at last, the first words he’d spoken since they agreed to retreat. “Using her to fight the battle he couldn’t. But aren’t we doing just the same?”

Sam’s jaw twitched as he turned the thought over for several long moments, still walking, still listening. “But he’s you,” Sam said cautiously. “It was your idea.”

“But do you think he feels that way?” Dean asked. “I mean, think about it. Some stranger turns up in his life, says, ‘We need you for a job in the future. Come with me. You won’t remember it and have literally nothing to gain.’ And we put him at risk because there’s no way to do it without him, just to shed him like an old coat when he’s not useful anymore.”

“I don’t know what he thinks about it,” Sam said. “But we said he had to be older. So he could make up his own mind, right? Rachel… Rachel was just a kid.”

“He’s just a kid,” said Dean. “And he… He deserves better.”

“He what?” said Sam.

“He deserves better than that, alright?” said Dean. “You know why he said yes to this, don’t you? Not for money, not for glory, not for pride. But because he thinks this is all he’s good for. If someone points at a monster and says, ‘You have to fight that,’ he doesn’t ask why. He doesn’t ask why no one else will do it. I never got to ask those questions.”

“I agree with you, for the record,” said Sam, scanning around once more, still hoping for some sign of survival. “I think I saw that, back when we were young. It was part of my beef with dad. Even if I couldn’t put it into words, or didn’t say as much. Our fights just spun out in other ways.”

“Yeah?” said Dean.

“Yeah.” Sam pursed his lips, thinking hard before speaking. “It wasn’t easy for me to see it because I looked up to you, but knowing what I do now… You went around expecting no one to give a damn about you, and that wasn’t fair.”

“Sammy,” said Dean.

“I know you don’t talk about it,” said Sam.

“Sammy, I think I hear something,” said Dean.

Sam shut up abruptly. The sound of a whistle. Hope flared up immediately, washed out every other thought. “This way,” said Sam.

They took off at a heavy jog through the snow, pausing and listening. Sam responded with an answering whistle, and from there they came more frequently. They picked out a new path along the mountainside, and there below them stood Young Dean.

Sam ran forward first, enwrapping Young Dean in a hug. Young Dean shivered, as much from relief as the cold. “You’re alright,” said Sam. “God, you had us worried.”

“I’m okay,” Young Dean promised, finally leaning back to look at his brother.

Dean arrived at Sam’s side, and when Sam stepped away, Dean caught his younger self in a hug in turn. Briefer, but when he pulled back he cupped a hand against Young Dean’s face. “Good to see you, brother,” he said.

“Not hurt,” said Young Dean, a look in his face like he either wanted approval or feared reprisal. “Not dead. Timeline’s intact.”

Dean shook his head. “Fuck the timeline,” he said. “We’re just glad you’re alright.”

“How did you get out of that?” Sam asked. “I’ve never seen anything like it.” The avalanche had been so sudden, so powerful. They’d seen twisters spiral across the flat lands of Kansas, been caught driving through the rainbands of a hurricane in South Carolina, but to watch part of a mountain fall away was something else. “You’ve barely got a scratch.”

“Wouldn’t be so sure of that,” said Young Dean, hands touching his ribs. “Felt like I got tumbled through the drier. But I must have got the edge of it. When it stopped, my one arm was above the snow and I dug myself out of it.”

“What about Cas?” Dean asked. “Where’s Cas?”

Young Dean’s smile vanished. “I thought he must be with you. I never saw him.”

“Dean,” said Sam. Dean was already walking away. “Dean, he’s come out of worse.”

Young Dean looked up at Sam with concern. “Can’t he have flown himself out of there? Demons can show up out of nowhere. Can’t angels do the same?”

“His wings were clipped long ago,” said Sam, shaking his head. “But he’s tough. Dean knows that.”

Young Dean’s eyes followed the track of footsteps leading away, out to a patch of moonlight. Dean stood there, face tipped up, not moving.

“What’s he doing?” Young Dean asked.

“He’s praying,” said Sam. “To Cas.”

“To Cas? He can do that?”

“Yeah. Times like this, when we don’t know where Cas is, it’s worth trying.”

“Can Cas answer back?”

“No,” said Sam. “Not in the same way, at least. But he hears it, wherever he is.”

“I’m here.” A tired voice from above. All three men turned as Cas carefully stepped down from a few levels of rock. His hair was damply rumpled, his trench coat worn through with shredded patches, his tie hanging onto his neck by a few threads. He still wore his new gloves.

“You found us,” said Dean.

“I heard the emergency whistles,” said Cas, alighting on the ground next to Dean. “I came straight here.”

“What happened back there?” said Dean. “The girl, is she…?”

Cas shook his head with a grim look. His gaze flicked to Young Dean for just a moment. “Rachel and Peter didn’t make it,” he said. “The demon with them vacated her vessel.”

“We haven’t done anything right tonight,” Sam said, hopeless. The promise of saving Eileen kept slipping away. “Two people are dead. We’ve lost our path to the griffin cave. We’ll get hypothermia before we find another way there.”

“About that,” said Cas. “I found a shortcut.”

* * *

The mouth of the cave wasn’t large. It could easily have been a bear cave, and Young Dean didn’t know how Sam could be so sure it wasn’t. Dean went in first, Young Dean following. After a few feet the cave opened up enough to stand upright. It smelled damp and animal. Young Dean’s heart pulsed in his ears.

He drew his machete as the four of them crept down, never knowing how far they’d have to delve to find the waiting animal.

The cave opened out, and signs of nesting and feeding tipped them off. Trails of grasses and broken branches. Broken pieces of animal bones.

Then the scrape of talons on the rocky floor of the cave. An animal backing up, aware of the presence of intruders. The hunters raised their lights.

The creature looked like nothing Young Dean had seen before. Most monsters, even at their worst, only looked like humans gone wrong. Werewolves and vampires and shifters. There were witches, and humans possessed by demons, and killing something with a human face sure wasn’t easy, but at least it was familiar. This?

The back end of a lion and the front of an eagle, but huge. The black pupil of its intensely yellow eyes focused in on Young Dean. It raised up on its hind legs and spread out its wings, spanning them across the width of the cave and snapping them forward once in a grave warning.

Sam and Dean flanked him on either side, prepared to distract and defend, while Cas stayed at his six, ready to whisk him out at a moment’s notice.

The griffin screeched, snapping its hooked beak a few times, then plunged its head toward Young Dean. A line of Cas’ helpfully echoed through his mind. _They’re quite deadly. They have poisonous talons, and their beaks are designed for scooping out entrails_.

Young Dean barely dodged that deadly beak. Meanwhile, Dean raised his gun and fired a shot. It boomed loudly through the cave and left Young Dean’s ears ringing, or maybe that was just the new round of screeching in response from the griffin.

The truth was that none of them really knew how to fight it. It swept out with its wings, knocking Sam low. You couldn’t take your eyes off its black talons, which scrabbled forward fiercely. Every time it opened its beak the horrible sound of its shriek made Young Dean’s heart seize. And there was the fact that of the four of them, only Young Dean’s blows would be of any use, and he couldn’t even get near enough.

The griffin didn’t leave any opening. It was on the defense, prepared to fight against every odd in order to protect the egg behind it. Its back legs never moved more than two or three steps away from the nest.

Sam barely rolled away from a dangerous swipe of the griffin’s taloned foot. Young Dean swung his machete, slicing off one of the deadly claws with a spray of blood. The screech from the griffin was more unholy than any before. Worse, Dean fired the gun at it again, and once more. It took the griffin’s attention off Sam, but Young Dean could hardly think and hardly see with all the sounds echoing in his head.

He saw the talons descending toward him, but it was like he forgot he needed to react. It was like it was already too late and they’d pierced his skin, dug into his flesh, and torn him straight apart. Blood loss would kill him before poison had a chance.

Dean saw it, though. Dean threw himself in the way of it. Talons scraped through his clothes. Across his raised arm, across his belly. Catching in his winter coat and half-dragging, half-tossing him across the floor of the cave.

Young Dean didn’t hesitate this time. He leapt all but under the thing and raised his machete up in a harsh thrust. Hollow bird bones cracked in its massive ribcage. Young Dean forced the machete deeper, cutting upwards to make sure the wound was a killing one. He felt it fighting around the blade of his knife. He felt the fight turn into an uncontrolled spasm.

He pulled out the machete, blood soaking his gloves and the sleeves of his coat and sprayed hot and red across his face. The griffin fell shuddering, dying; then still, dead.

“Dean.” Cas rushed over, knelt by the older Dean with Sam. Dean was conscious, holding a shaking arm over his abdomen, trying to make himself sit up.

“It’s not even that deep,” Dean told them, face ashen, eyes on Young Dean. “You did it. You did it, man.”

“He’s hurt,” said Young Dean. “The poison, it’s gonna kill him.”

“It isn’t,” said Sam firmly. “We have antivenom. How bad’s the bleeding, Dean?”

“I said it’s not bad,” Dean insisted, though the grimace of pain on his face didn’t uphold his case. “Barely grazed me.”

“We should address his wounds outside the cave,” said Cas, eyeing the passage warily. “So we aren’t cornered if something decides to come for the egg.”

“Right,” said Sam. “You get him out there, Cas. Teen-Dean?” Sam got up, carefully moving around the broken angle of the griffin’s wing. “You alright? Let’s grab that egg.”

Young Dean gave a loose nod of his head, feeling speechless and unsteady. He’d never killed anything so big before.

He’d never had anyone dive in front of him like that to take a hit that was meant for him. 

He watched Cas loop Dean’s arm around his neck, raising him up to his feet. Dean leaned heavily on him for support, but stubbornly insisted on walking out. Cas didn’t push it. Didn’t comment on the slow hobble or the occasional sharp pant or huff of pain.

It was annoying to see Dean so insistent on being tough and noble. Even knowing it was his future self. That one day he would be that man. He would do this very thing.

Coming of age, indeed.

Young Dean cautiously stepped into the large nest. Sam hung back, and Young Dean only now realised that there was something up with his left arm. He held the wrist gingerly, and looked to be testing the motion of his fingers.

“Break something?” Young Dean asked.

“Maybe,” said Sam. “It’s fine. But I might make you carry the egg.”

“If you went and dropped it after all we just went through…” said Young Dean. Sam huffed a laugh. Young Dean knelt down in the warm nest, brushing aside stiff grass and downy feathers. The egg had a texture like marble, variegated in colour with splotches of chrome over muted blue. It felt warm from the heat of the griffin’s body, but Young Dean found it some relief that he couldn’t feel something living in it. Maybe it made him weak to have pity for it, for whatever the Arimaspoi wanted to do with it, but sue him. He felt for the thing.

He carefully climbed out of the nest, bearing the egg. Sam’s light shone the way out.

“That’s twice you saved me back there,” said Sam. “First with the demons, then with the griffin.”

“You’re my little brother,” said Young Dean. “It’s my job to look out for you.”

“I just thought it might be the other way around this time,” said Sam. “But there’s no stopping you being you.”

“Well, you look after him and we’ll call it square,” said Young Dean, nodding to the mouth of the cave up ahead, where in the open air Cas carefully let Dean down to the ground. Cas methodically peeled away Dean’s bulky winter coat, getting a better look at the wounds.

“You’re a mess, Teen-Dean,” said Dean, looking at the blood on Young Dean’s face and clothes rather than the scar across his stomach.

“You’re one to talk,” said Young Dean.

Sam took off his backpack, rooting to the bottom for the first aid stock.

“Can’t you angel-heal this, Cas?” Young Dean asked.

Cas eyed Dean briefly, but answered to Young Dean. “He insisted I don’t. I need all my power to get you back.”

“I can stay here a little longer,” said Young Dean. “I don’t mind. You guys aren’t the worst company I’ve kept.”

“The longer you stay, the harder it is for me to return you,” said Cas. “We’re already pushing it.”

“I’m fine, believe me,” said Dean. He winced, biting his tongue as Sam smeared a clear, viscous goop over the angry slice across his stomach. “Just fine,” he wheezed.

“This stops the poison from spreading and prevents infection,” Sam explained, applying the same stuff to the long scar on Dean’s forearm.

“And stings like a motherfucker,” Dean added in.

Sam ignored him. One had to in a first aid situation. Dean made for a terrible patient. “Cas, can you wrap that up?” He tossed the dressings and bandages to Cas, cleaning the last of the goop off his hand.

Sam moved next to fill up a needle from a small vial. “This part asks like a booster shot,” he said. “To kick up the antivenom effectiveness. But it needs a few hours to do its thing. We’ll be able to give him the antivenom after we get to the motel.” He neatly administered the shot, then looked up at Young Dean. “He’s going to be alright, you understand?”

Young Dean nodded his head, still unable to look away from the injuries on his older body. Cas looped the bandages once more below Dean’s back, then taped it off. His fingers tested the tightness, slipping just underneath the edge. Cas gave a nod that it would do, chiefly to himself, but Young Dean let go of a piece of his worry. Cas wouldn’t let anything happen to Dean.

How they made it back to the car Young Dean could barely recall. Cas supported Dean the whole way, and when they got to the SUV they reclined one of the second row seats to lay Dean out in. While they saw to him, Young Dean wiped blood from his face with some of the fresh white snow. He forgot his bloody gloves beneath a tree.

He sat in the seat next to Dean, egg cradled in his lap. Grateful for the heat from the car vents, and more grateful still for the silence. He thought Dean had fallen asleep next to him, but then he noticed Dean had his face tipped towards him, eyes studying him.

Young Dean met his eye, and Dean smiled drowsily.

“You did great back there, kid,” Dean said. His lids were heavy over his eyes. “I’m proud of you.”

Young Dean stared, didn’t say anything. He wanted to say that Dean was incoherent, that he spoke under the influence of some medicated high, but what Sam gave him was just a booster shot. Maybe this was some side-effect of blood-loss, or of adrenaline. But Dean’s eyes looked too clear and sane.

“Thanks,” said Young Dean. He didn’t know how to respond to those words. He’d never had the practice.

Dean laughed weakly, tipping his head so that he looked back at the roof of the car. “What do you know?” he said. “You were pure enough after all.”

Young Dean couldn’t speak past the swollen feeling in his chest. The rest of the trip stayed silent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> » me: I don't care for the monsters or fight scenes, that's not what I watch _Supernatural_ for  
> also me: anyway here's a MOTW case fic with multiple fight sequences  
> » that said, I only barely resisted the urge to make the griffin disappointingly humanoid in an homage to TV budgets  
> » chapters all have titles now, so that's fun! perhaps I should've done that earlier but we all need to remember that time isn't real  
> » ch. 6 title reference: "When the Curtain Calls for You" by Jonathan Fire*Eater


	7. the torch we all must bear

Dean didn’t want to admit he was cold because Sam would take it as a sign he was dying. He’d been cold since they arrived in this godforsaken mountain town, and the negligible heating in this motel room didn’t do anything to help.

He didn’t want to worry Young Dean either. While Cas and Sam covered a lockbox in demon- and angel-proofing sigils to transport the egg without detection, Dean lay in a dingy motel bed, with Young Dean sitting at the foot of it. Young Dean looked dejected. He still had blood in his hair, bruises on his ribs. There was no saving the coat they got him, though Dean wished he could pass it back to the past as a simple gift. That kind of thing wasn’t allowed, though.

The griffin’s talons had left neat slices, easily stitched, but Dean still felt the uncanny ache of them. Sam hadn’t administered the antidote yet. He wanted the booster to set. Dean talked just to take his mind off the persistent pain.

“You don’t look excited to go back,” he said.

Young Dean watched Cas and Sam work at the protection sigils, conferring with one another. They knew so much more about the supernatural than Young Dean had ever conceived of. And he liked seeing them interact. They respected one another, but their relationship was distinctly different to what existed between Cas and Dean.

“I guess there’s a part of me that wants to see how things turn out,” said Young Dean. “Do we get the sword? Do we help save Eileen? Do I survive this injury?” He gave a nod to Dean’s bandaged stomach. It made Dean laugh.

“I feel okay, kid,” said Dean. “Better once I get the second part of that antidote. We’ve lived through worse than this.”

“If you say so,” said Young Dean.

“I do say so,” said Dean.

“If it weren’t for Sammy back home… I dunno. Maybe I would want to stay around here for a little. See what it’s like.”

“Trust me, you’re going back to an easier time,” said Dean. “Before angels and gods and the repeated apocalypse. It’s almost refreshing.”

“Easier in some ways,” said Young Dean, looking down at his hands with a frown. “You don’t have it so bad, here.”

“I guess,” Dean said quietly. “I guess there are some things I haven’t been so sorry to leave behind.”

“I know I wasn’t exactly easy on you when I got here,” said Young Dean, like he was the one obliged to make amends. “I might’ve said some things I shouldn’t have said. I might’ve made you think I didn’t like you.”

“Now where would I get that idea?” said Dean, forcing a smile he didn’t feel.

“Shut up,” said Young Dean. “I’m trying to _say_ something here.” He pressed a thumb into his palm, rubbing at his hand for the sake of idle movement. “We don’t usually get the chance to see ourselves, like how an outsider would. My gut reaction was to hate it. But it’s changed.” Young Dean looked up from his hands to meet Dean’s eyes. “You know what we felt like, sometimes. Being around Dad, being around hunters. Like we had to keep up appearances. Like we had to be seen as tough. Always proving we belonged, and always scared shitless someone would point us out and say, ‘He’s not right. He’s not enough.’ You heard it. The comments that we were too…” Too pretty. Too fine-featured. Conspicuous in just the way he looked, no matter how he tried to conceal it beneath a macho front and John’s over-sized leather jacket. No matter how tall Dean got, no matter how hard he trained himself, no matter how ruthless a hunter he became.

“Anyway,” said Young Dean, voice dragging past the words he couldn't speak. “I look at you, the man I turn into, and I’m not worried about any of those things. ‘Cause it’s so fucking obvious that if I can see it, everyone can see it. You’re brave. You’re honourable. You picked out the best parts of the people we’ve known to live by, and that means I can do it too. It means I will do it. And I’m proud of that. I’m proud of who I become.”

“You’re building me up too much,” said Dean. “There were things you were right about, earlier. Being miserable. Being a coward.”

Young Dean didn’t know how to refute that, biting on his lower lip while he thought. “Well,” he said at last. “Both things can be true. You’re a good man and a coward. But if you don’t like the second part, then stop being so chickenshit.”

“Easy for you to say. You don’t have to deal with the consequences.”

“I just don’t know why you’re so scared,” said Young Dean. “When it’s so clear he’s got something for you.”

Dean shook his head, a hard warning in his eyes. He glanced over to Sam and Cas, standing by the table in the kitchenette, talking out some kind of plan for the next few hours. Neither of them seemed to hear or notice the two Deans in low-toned conversation.

Young Dean leaned in, his face taking on an overly-sympathetic expression. “He wants more kids, you know. You should think about it, while you still got the energy.”

“You’re such a little shit,” Dean hissed.

“And here I thought we were having a moment,” said Young Dean.

“I’ve suddenly just remembered how infuriating it is to have a conversation with myself,” said Dean, grinding the heel of his hand against his forehead. Young Dean laughed.

“Okay, they’re having too good a time over there.” Sam’s voice cut across the room. He straightened up and crossed toward the bed. He’d wrapped his bum hand, but wasn’t taking himself in to get it looked at. A possible break couldn’t be lower on his list of priorities when Eileen’s fate hung in the balance. “You ready to call it a night, Teen-Dean?”

Young Dean looked up at Sam, taking in his older face and the weight of years. Sam went through Hell, literally and figuratively, but look what he became. Scary smart, a great fighter, a loyal brother, and someone who acted with heart. Young Dean wished there was a way he could avoid forgetting this. He could be blind to his own future, sure, but he wanted to remember that Sam would never leave him for good. He wanted to remember that Sam would fall and love and fight for it. He wanted to remember Sam’s automatic support. Something Young Dean had never dreamed of asking for.

It was bittersweet to have to say goodbye. Young Dean stood up. And thought maybe he wouldn’t mind returning to his time and looking down at his little brother once again.

“Can I say one thing?” he asked.

Sam nodded, his expectant aspect as ready for something terrible as something good.

“Never listen to this fucker when he gives you a hard time,” said Young Dean, pointing to Dean. “He’s full of shit.”

“ _Hey_ ,” said Dean.

Sam laughed. “I’ll keep that in mind,” he said. He pulled Young Dean into one final hug.

When they parted, Young Dean turned to Castiel. “Well, Cas. I’m ready,” he said.

Cas crossed to his side. Young Dean shared one final look with his older self, giving a nod of his head. Cas touched his temple and they disappeared.

Young Dean’s feet landed on the asphalt directly outside Schaffer’s. Cas was still with him, and he still remembered all that happened the past few days. It was 1998 again. The cars and trucks in the lot looked older. A payphone stood to the left of the bar entrance.

“You’re still here,” said Young Dean.

“Just making sure everything is as we left it,” Cas said, looking around with critically narrowed eyes as if he could, with a glance, assess and calculate the very make-up of the world. He came away satisfied.

“Cas,” said Young Dean.

“Yes?” said Cas.

“Nothin’,” said Young Dean. He put his hands in his pockets and looked down at the ground between them. He saw he was wearing his old clothes. He didn’t have blood in his hair. His ribs and shoulders didn’t hurt from the pounding of the avalanche. Damn, Cas was a good multitasker.

“Profound,” said Cas. “If that’s all…”

“That’s not all,” said Young Dean. “I don’t even know how to tell you. How good it is to know you’re there for him. Whatever ends up happening.”

Cas didn’t answer directly. He looked puzzled, stayed quiet, finally saying, “I’m sorry I have to take away your memories of what happened.”

“So am I,” said Young Dean. “Sure you can’t leave something there?”

“What would you want to keep?” Cas asked.

Young Dean thought about it seriously. His first thought was that he’d like to remember Cas, but that simply wouldn’t do. Knowing about Cas meant knowing about angels, and knowing about angels would, for all intents and purposes, ‘destabilize the universe.’ He briefly felt he wanted to know about going to Hell so that he could avoid it, only it wasn’t avoidable and dreading it wouldn’t make life any better. He wanted to know that he lived on into the future, and that Sammy was alright, but those hopes accompanied him every day. They made him careful when he needed to be careful, and daring when he needed to be daring.

Finally, he said, “There’s one thing… One thing I want to be like him in. See, I fell off the mountain and they thought I might be dead, but when they found me again… Dean, he…” Young Dean rubbed his jaw, where Dean’s hand had clasped. “He reached out like I was a brother or a son and he looked dead at me and I knew he really cared. Not just for his own sake, but because it mattered to him that I was okay. And the way I felt like I belonged right then… I want to be able to make someone else feel like that. I want to remember the difference it made. To be able to do something so simple that can mean the world to someone.”

Cas looked at him for a moment in long consideration. “Dean, that might be something that’s existed in you all along,” he said. “But I can let you remember that comfort. Even if you will never recall the details.”

“That means a lot,” said Young Dean.

“And I’ll offer my thanks, even if you won’t remember it,” said Cas. “You’re such a gracious, courageous man, Dean. Thank you. We couldn’t have done it without your help.”

This time the praise didn’t hit him like a sucker-punch, the way it had the first time he’d heard it from Dean. No, this time it filled him with longing. With a desire for a world where he got to hear it more than once. Where he got to remember it.

“Cas,” he said. “I can’t wait to meet you.” He stepped forward, wrapped his arms around Cas in a hug. After a moment Cas’ arms raised up, returning the embrace. Dean didn’t stop himself short, didn’t make himself pull away early. This was his last and only chance, and he wouldn’t give it up for the sake of pride, for the sake of appearances. He let himself feel the rise and fall of his own chest against Castiel’s. He let his chin bury against the snow-damp fabric of Cas’ trench coat.

“You’ll take care of him, alright?” said Young Dean as he pulled away.

“That’s an easy promise to make,” said Cas with a fond shake of his head, a smile touching his lips.

“And let him look after you, too,” said Young Dean. Cas tipped his head curiously, eyes searching to understand. “He wants to,” said Young Dean. He tapped his temple. “I’d know.”

For such simple words, for a being of such eternal wisdom, Cas didn’t seem to fully comprehend. He cautiously answered, “I’ll… try.”

“Well, I guess this is me,” said Young Dean, twisting to look at the lit up sign for the bar. “Wish I could say I’ll always remember all the good times we had, but I won’t. Goodbye, Castiel.”

Dean looked down at the illuminated buttons of the jukebox as Led Zeppelin’s “Ramble On” wound to a close. His thumb flicked at the peeling label of his beer, and he calculated once more the odds of getting a game of pool in before the night was over. If he could get someone to bet a little higher, he’d only have to win one. He reached up to the pocket of his shirt, wanting to double-check how much he had to play with.

His fingertips met a fatter bundle than he anticipated. He looked around cautiously, then pulled out the money, tallying the bills without having to consciously do the math. Sixty-eight bucks. This could solve his problems for a week.

Where had it come from? That didn’t matter. He’d get groceries for him and Sam and pay out the motel bill. Spend it all before it vanished like leprechaun gold. He drank down the last of his beer and left Schaffer’s pub.

* * *

“I’ll leave once Cas gets back,” said Sam, injecting the second dose of the antidote into Dean’s arm.

“Take someone with you,” said Dean. “Call Jody, call Charlie, call Garth, but you can’t trust those Arimasp-holes on your own. They tried to send a demon after it.”

“I won’t go alone,” Sam promised.

“I don’t like you not having me or Cas there,” said Dean.

“I don’t love it either, but the antivenom is gonna lay you out flat. It gets worse before it gets better. And we don’t know what kind of shape Cas will be in.”

Cas appeared in the middle of the motel room, swaying on his feet. He staggered on the spot, then caught himself on his bed, sitting heavily.

“Speak of the angel,” said Sam. He taped a square of gauze over the needle mark on Dean’s biceps. Dean frowned at the makeshift bandage, then over at Cas.

“How’d it go?” he asked.

“He’s back in his own time. He doesn’t remember.” Cas looked like he was about to be sick. Dean didn’t know if angels could throw up. Cas closed his eyes and swallowed hard, looking over at Dean. “Think back, Dean,” he said. “You don’t remember.”

Dean tried. He tried to recall what this trip looked like from the point of view of his younger self. But it was mixed up with the present. He truly only knew one side of it. “I don’t,” he admitted. “Nothing’s different.”

“Then I did what I needed to,” said Cas. He slumped back heavily across the foot of the bed, still in his coat and clothes.

“Cas, hey,” said Sam. “Hold up. Your clothes are soaked from being caught in the avalanche. That can’t be comfortable.”

“I can’t dry them,” Cas said petulantly. “I’m very tired.”

“Hopeless,” muttered Sam. He got up and pulled a change of clothes from Dean’s bag. Dean tried to reach out an arm, but his whole body felt strangely heavy and no matter how hard he thought about lifting his hand, he couldn’t do anything.

“Sammy, I can’t move,” he said.

“Yeah. That’d be the antivenom,” said Sam.

“Oh my god,” Dean said, tongue heavy in his mouth. _This is very fucked up_ , he wanted to say. He tried moving his hand again. He closed his eyes.

When he opened them again it was to a dark motel room, Cas passed out cold in the bed opposite, breathing softly. Dean’s limbs were cramping up, his torso spasming, particularly around his stomach. His arm was bad too. He dimly recalled Sam saying that the side-effects of the antivenom would be uncomfortable, potentially quite painful, but that meant it was working.

Sam, the bastard, was long gone. Dean bore the increasing ache of cramping muscles, tension in his back, a pounding in his head, for a good two hours while Cas slept like the dead. He fell into another restless round of sleep when the ache dulled down to a numb kind of torture.

Dean startled awake again many hours later. Sunlight edged around the closed blinds of the motel room. Cas remained fast asleep, blankets tangled around him. Dean felt alert, stiff, breathless. His shirt was soaked through with sweat from collar to hem. His skin and hair completely damp, like someone had dumped a bucket of water on him. He didn’t even know he _could_ sweat so much.

He got out of bed, shaking with chills, every limb still aching, and the scars on his arm and stomach feeling like they were on fire. He went to the thermostat on the wall and uselessly tried to crank the heat. He needed to shower, but first he drank three full glasses of water for his dry mouth and dehydrated body.

He had to wash carefully, keeping clear of his stitches, but he felt miles better not to be covered in his own cold sweat. The warm water of the shower had been good for his aching limbs.

But he was still sapped of energy, with the low pulse of a headache throbbing in the back of his skull. Being on his feet for all of fifteen minutes left him exhausted. He stopped at the end of his bed, where the sheets were mussed and clammy-wet from his feverish sweat.

He looked at the other bed, where the sheets were dry and warm and Cas slept in tousled serenity, completely out for the count. He looked comfortable in Dean’s clothes, human in his sleep. He was too tired to overthink it and adjusting the thermostat had been to no effect, so Dean lifted the blanket and slid into the bed. Every sore part of his body thanked him for it.

Cas stirred, eyes cracking open, grumpy and sleepy and muttering something unintelligible that had the sound of a question. Asking what Dean was doing, probably.

“I sweat the bed,” said Dean, tongue still heavy.

“You _what_?”

“Don’t worry about it,” he mumbled, nosing his face toward the pillow and passing out.

It was dark again the next time he woke. His brain wasn’t so tired any more, but that low ache still spread through his body. He was miles better than where he’d been, but anything would’ve been better than the cramps and seizing muscles, the feverish chills and sweats.

Dean had barely shifted, but Cas stirred beside him, waking up in the way people do, following one another. He took in a deep breath, pushing himself up a little on one arm, looking around himself in the dark room as if to find his bearings. The motel. The muted sound of a TV in the room next door. The mountain wind pushing against the outside walls, stealing away the heat. But Dean was warm enough, now, as long as he didn’t leave these blankets.

“How you feeling?” Dean said, voice low and drowsy, eyes drifting closed once more.

“Tired,” Cas answered, relaxing back down into the mattress. He settled his head against the pillow. He gave another breath-balancing sigh. “For a moment, I thought I wouldn’t make it back.”

Dean froze. Cas said it with such a tired indifference, but it sent Dean’s brain into a mild panic. What would that have meant? Would Cas have been stuck in ‘98, or some time in between? Did he mean he thought he’d never make it back at all? Dean couldn’t conceive of Cas not returning to him. He couldn’t imagine carrying on without him. He couldn’t imagine waking up in this motel room alone and discovering Cas hadn’t come back, would never come back, and that Dean hadn’t even known their last moment together was goodbye.

Cas shifted onto his back, wearily rubbing at one eye, and Dean had to say something. “If I knew it was that dicey, I wouldn’t have asked it.”

“I knew the risks,” said Cas.

“What would have happened?” Dean asked. He tried to sound nonchalant. Like he wasn’t terrified of the very idea of losing Cas like that. And lying beside him, arms and shoulders less than an inch apart from touching, didn’t make the dread hazard of it feel any less real or imminently possible.

“Uh,” said Cas, and he opened his eyes so that he could narrow them at the ceiling, thinking it over. “I don’t _know_. But there’s a chance that over-extending my grace like that would’ve consumed my mortal coil, and then my soul, for fuel. It’s never been proven that would happen, though.”

“Christ, Cas,” said Dean, dragging his hand over his face. “You shouldn’t have done it.”

“I made it back,” said Cas, defiant and cranky. “Rich of you to act like you wouldn’t do the same thing in my place.”

Dean tried for a dirty look, but when Cas saw it, briefly turning his head to take it in, he answered with a laugh. Loose and easy, smile lingering on his face even as he looked thoughtfully back up at the ceiling. “How is that antiserum?” he asked.

“God-awful,” said Dean, shuffling around to resettle his stiff limbs. “Think next time I’ll just let the poison do its work. Can’t be much worse.”

“I’d heal you if I weren’t so… depleted,” said Cas. “Sorry that I can’t do more.”

“Don’t have to apologize, Cas,” said Dean. “Not interested in seeing that mortal coil of yours eaten up for grace-fuel.”

“In a couple of days,” Cas promised with another tired sigh. “You’ll be through the worst of it already, but I can speed the rest along for you.”

“You just worry about getting your own rest,” said Dean. He tried to shift again because his whole midsection felt sore and uncomfortable, but he wanted to stretch out his tight muscles. He moved one arm up behind his head, the other resting on the centre of his chest. “Think this is what the future looks like?” he asked, donning an absent smile. “You all tuckered out, me all aches and pains. Eighty-five or ninety, cranky old bastards, all creaky and decrepit.”

He glanced at Cas, expecting some mildly amusing response. Cas looked up blankly at a point on the ceiling, very still. “I wouldn’t mind,” he answered.

Dean hadn’t realised when he said it. How it sounded. Like forty-and-more years from now they’d be doing this, lying in bed beside each other. Suggesting they spent a whole life together, never having parted. He hadn’t meant it that way, but then Cas had answered…

And Cas was Cas, so he probably missed the implication altogether. He could never have meant it on purpose. Angels didn’t feel that way. Couldn’t, surely. What was forty years to Cas? Forty years might be one tenth of a cosmic second compared to the age of the universe. It wouldn’t matter to him, couldn’t matter. So his words must mean something different, something other than the obvious and most reasonable takeaway.

Dean, panicking and frozen, spoke stupidly, grabbing wildly for a change of topic: “If we even get there,” he said, like it would be so easy to shrug off the incredible gravity of their words. “Hey, what did you think of Teen-Dean?”

The tension in Cas’ profile slackened. Not with a snap—not breaking free—but with resignation. His lashes dropped low over his eyes. He thought about his answer, then quietly said, “It was rewarding to be able to meet him.”

Dean’s brain started to catch up. He couldn’t look away from Cas. He’d hurt him. And cowardice was one thing but cruelty was another. Dean didn’t want to think of how Young Dean would look at him with scorn and berate him for this. “I think he admired you,” said Dean. He was trying, failing. It was easier to talk about Young Dean than himself.

“He admired _you_ ,” Cas corrected.

“I think I admire you.” Dean found his heart beating hard and fast under the hand on his chest. Cas frowned, puzzled, still looking at the roof. A being of eternal wisdom who couldn’t comprehend the simplest words. Dean spoke again before he could stop himself. “Cas, I think I adore you.”

Cas turned his head, meeting Dean’s eyes, then searching his face. He looked achingly wistful. “Did Teen-Dean tell you?” he asked, raising up a bit on one arm.

“Tell me what?” asked Dean. “Wait. What? What did you talk about?”

“I thought he must have figured it out,” said Cas.

“Figured out what?”

Cas half-laughed. “What you never have.” He leaned in, closing the distance between them, pausing a hair’s breadth away like he might have to stop. Might have read this wrong.

Dean placed his hand on Cas’ jaw. He met his mouth in a kiss. He dragged a hand up into Cas’ short, dark hair. He hadn’t kissed a man before, didn’t know the scrape of stubble or the feeling of broad, flat planes above him. But this was Cas, whose mouth was warm and tender, kissing away only to brush his lips against Dean’s once more.

Breathing was something Dean had to remind himself to do. “I don’t want to be miserable,” he murmured. His thumb brushed at Cas’ cheek.

“Hm?”

“There’s enough in life that’s unpredictable, that’s painful. That we gotta face or learn to live with. But you take the good where you can get it. I'm not interested in wasting time any more. I won’t be a sad sack just because.”

Cas couldn’t seem to resist being close, now that it was an option. His forehead bumped against Dean’s, rested there. He smiled. “Is this Teen-Dean talking?” he asked.

“Hm? Maybe. He and I discussed something like it, yeah.”

“Then I change my answer,” said Cas.

“You what?”

“What I think of Teen-Dean. I think he was the best thing to happen to you.”

“Well, I think you’re biased,” said Dean. He couldn’t stop smiling, like an idiot. Eyes crinkled in the corners, heart still beating double-time. Because Cas was smiling too in that rare, sweet, lingering way.

God, he used to be cool about stuff like this. It used to be: a flirtatious kiss, follow up with some smooth line, keep up an aloof and untouchable air. It had kept his heart suitably safe, suitably disengaged. Now here he was all laid up, cut open and delirious, unable to stop himself from grinning. But then, as he told Young Dean, it was different when it counted.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> » ch. 7 title reference: "The Rain Song" by Led Zeppelin (because, of course)  
> » sincerely, my thanks to you for reading this - very much hope it made you feel good and cathartic things along the way  
> » this was a blast to write and share and your feedback is & has been everything to me so, like, round of applause to you  
> » I exist nowhere else online, or in the real world, or in time, (which is fictional), but it's been a slice, y'all


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